Patricia Wells’ Roast Lamb with Potato and Tomato Gratin

We first met Pat in 1978, when she wrote about us for the food pages of The New York Times—our first big story! We liked her immediately and became fast friends, only to learn we would lose her to Paris. But an ocean has not come between us, and Pat and her husband, Walter, have become family. We’re sure that those who have followed her wonderfully written Food Lover’s Guides to Paris and France feel she is their friend, too.

“This dish—or variations of it—has become o