Lamb Tava

I love any dishes that you can throw all of the ingredients in a pan, leave them for a few hours and they become more than the sum of their parts. Tessa Kiros' Lamb Tava is one of these dishes. It is all about great flavours and ingredients.

It is a Cypriot dish from her book Falling Cloudberry's and became a firm favourite after it's first outing.




Recipe to follow

Slow cooked shoulder of lamb

If I do say so myself this recipe is a stunner. It's one of those dishes which is far greater than a sum of its parts. It takes a very long time
to cook but the preparation is quick and easy and as I was hosting a little dinner party for friends directly after working a long day this was just the dish.

It's an adaptation of a James Martin recipe I found years ago on the BBC website. Over the years it's changed a little bit from the original.

You will need:
A shoulder of lamb
4 cloves of garlic
Half a tin of anchovies
4 sprigs of rosemary
A handful of thyme
2 bay leaves
300ml red wine (replace this with water to make it 'cleaner')
300ml water
2 tins tomatoes
2 tins butter beans (leave these out to make it Paleo)
3 tbsp tomato purée
One beef stock cube
Seasoning

Serves 4-6

I start by taking a shoulder of lamb and making deep incisions all over the joint. In each incision I put a piece of anchovy, a few of rosemary leaves and a slice of garlic. For a whole shoulder I'd use about 8 anchovy fillets, two large garlic cloves and a couple of sprigs of rosemary.

I then heat up some oil in a large my oven proof pan which also had a lid and sear the meat on both sides. Once browned remove from the heat and in the juices gently fry 2 chopped onions and 2 cloves of sliced garlic. Add a bunch of thyme, a couple of sprigs of rosemary and a couple of bay leaves (preferably fresh. I get mine from my friends garden).

Once the onion is translucent and golden, place the shoulder of lamb back in the pan and add about 300ml red wine, two tins of chopped tomatoes, two tins of butter beans, about 3 tablespoons of tomato purée, a beef stock cube (I use Kallo as it doesn't contain MSG) a small amount of salt (as the anchovies and stock are both salty), plenty of black pepper and about 300ml water.

Give it a good stir, put the lid on and place in an oven pre-heated to 140C. Cook for 8-12 hours checking occasionally to stir the mixture and add more water if it starts I get more dry. When you remove from the oven spoon off any excess fat. By this point it is so soft and unctuous that I serve it in the pan it was cooked in and simply use a couple of forks to pull apart the meat.

The original recipe serves it with mash but as it has the beans in the sauce I just serve with mixed green veg. In this case I blanched some green beans, sugar snap peas and asparagus and then drained them and dressed them with lemon juice, rapeseed oil and chopped mint.

The beautiful lamb...




I am going to submit this recipe as part of the New June Herbs on Saturday blog challenge.





I love herbs and a you can see from previous posts I cook with then a lot. Since I've moved I have a small garden and am now the proud owner of a little herb garden. It's not much and I've focused on pretty standard herbs, but it's mine and I've been caring for it and watching it flourish and I'm proud of it (I have tried growing some Thai basil but as I type the little seedlings are curling up and giving up).

Christchurch Food Festival

I have been meaning to write up this post for a while, but life has got in the way. A couple of weeks ago my mum and I went to the Christchurch food festival in Dorest. It's a well established festival and has a food market and various events. On the Saturday there were various demo's and we attended two. The first was Paul Potts from local restaurant Splinters and the second was the lovely James Martin.

Paul Potts made the following recipes:

Seabass fillet on tomato and red onion tarte tatin

Pan fry 5 cherry tomatoes, halved, season, add basil oil and chopped red onion and put into a 4 inch flan dish. You can arrange the tomatoes to all face the same way if you like. Top with a circle of puff pastry and bake in a hot oven for about 15 mins until golden.

Take a fillet of sea bass and at the wide end cut out a 'V' shape. This should remove any stray bones. Sear the fish in a hot pan, skin side down. Once brown and crispy turn over and top with a knob of butter.

Turn out the tart, top with the sea bass and drizzle with basil oil and a little balsamic vinegar and garnish with pea shoots.

Tuna Warm Salad Nicoise with Basil Oil

Boil 6 asparagus spears for a couple of minutes. Add a handful of sugar snaps to warm through. You want them to still retain their crunch. Whilst they are cooking fry 3 cooked new potatoes, cut in half, a few cherry tomatoes (roasted if desired) and a few olives.

Make a dressing of 3 parts oil, one part white wine vinegar, wholegrain mustard, chopped parsley, chives and seasoning.

Season a tuna steak, sear in a little oil. Only cook for a few minutes on each side as it is best served pink. Add a knob of butter to the top and put to one side to rest.

Serve the vegetables, dressed with the vinegarette and topped with seared tuna and pea shoots.

Scallop and Bacon Salad with Toasted Pine Nuts

Remove the roe from the scallops and the little muscle. Add a little oil to a hot pan and fry the scallops and some strips of bacon.

Julienne (finely shred) a carrot, courgette and half a leek. Add the fried strips of bacon, salad leaves, vinegarette and seasoning and toss. Top with the scallops and a drizzle of basil oil.

Scallops with Curried Parsnip and Apple Puree

Prepare the scallops as above.

Fry some cooked parsnips and apple together, add a little curry powder and seasoning and stock and blend to a smooth puree.

Serve by placing each scallop on a spoonful of puree.

James Martin made the following recipes:

Pea and Watercress Soup

Sweat one crushed clove of garlic and 1 finely shredded shallot in a some butter.

Bring some chicken or vegetable stock to the boil and add a glass of white wine. Add, a bunch of parsley, the garlic and shallot, a bag of watercress (holding back a few sprigs for garnish). frozen peas and seasoning. Blend.

Boil and egg in water for 5.5 minutes. Peel the egg carefully. Dip in flour, then beaten egg and then breadcrumbes and deep fry until golden.

Blanch some asparagus and then warm through in a little butter.

Serve the soup, topped with the asparagus and the egg with the top cut off, a sprig of water cress and a piece of crispy bacon.

Lamb Salad

Blanch some asparagus and put in iced water.

Remove the sinew from a loin of lamb and quicklysear in a pan in rapeseed oil. The pop it into a hot oven for 8 minutes. Remove from the oven and pour over some sweet chilli sauce and put to one side to rest.

Make a pickle from some chopped radishes, the blanched asparagus, chopped cucumber, shallots, turnip (sliced on a mandolin), lime zest and then pour over a dressing made by putting white wine vinegar, a big pinch of sugar, a pinch of salt and the juice of a lime in a hot pan.

Serve by placing the pickle on a plate. Topped with slices of the lamb, a few sprigs of watercress and a few mint leaves. Drizzle with rapeseed oil.

Summer Pudding

Take a dariole mould or a tea cup and line with cling film. Cut the crusts off some cheap white bread and cut circles for the bottom of the mould and strips for the side.

Blend some fresh strawberries with some frozen berries, icing sugar and a little water and sieve to make a sauce, dip the bread in the sauce and line the mould. Mix more fresh strawberries with frozen berries and basil and squash into the mould, add a spoonful of clotted cream to the mould and top with a rough of bread dipped in the sauce. Release from the mould and drizzle over the rest of the sauce. Top with fresh berries, a clotted cream quenelle, a basil leaf, a dusting of icing sugar and some sugar work. You can make a sugar swirl by wrapping cooled sugar syrup around a steel (for a smaller one) or a rolling pin (for a larger one).

Moroccan style lamb and butter bean stew

Last weekend I had some lovely slow roasted, boned and rolled, lamb shoulder. There was some left over so I decided tyo give it a new lease of life.

This would also be tasty with left over roast chicken but if you don't have any left overs you can always gently brown some stewing lamb before adding everything else and cook it for longer until the meat starts to give way.

It's very easy to make, pretty much a case of throwing everything in. I'm trying to eat cleanly at the moment so I just had it with some broccoli but you could also serve it with some couscous or even as a meal in its own right.



Recipe

Serves 2, but can easily be doubled or halved

Approx 100g leftover roast lamb
1 large onion
1 large carrot
1 crushed garlic clove
1/2 tsp each of cinnamon, crushed cumin seeds and coriander seeds
A bay leaf
1/2 tin of tomatoes
1/2 tbsp tomato purée
Small tin of butter beans (leave these out if you want to make it Paleo)
A large handful of kale
1/2 beef stock cube
100ml water

1 Sauté the roughly chopped onion and carrot. After a couple of minutes add the crushed garlic cloves and the spices.
2. Add the remaining ingredients and cook for about 30 mins adding more water if it becomes too dry.
3. Serve on its own or with broccoli and couscous.

Incredible Roasted Shoulder of Lamb Courtesy of Jamie Oliver

There is something magical about Sunday roasts, especially in the autumn and winter. They always remind me of growing up and my mum cooking a big family meal. Apart from a phase of being veggie in my teens I have always loved the smell that fills the house as the roast cooks hours before it's time for dinner. For me meat either has to barely see the heat or be cooked very low and slow for hours and hours. This recipe is the latter. Fortunately I always prefer to eat Sunday roasts at dinner time as if I eat a big meal at lunch I never feel like doing much after! If is wanted to eat this at lunch I would've had to be up at a seriously unpleasant time for a Sunday...

This is a super simple way to give a shoulder of lamb a lovely dressing up.

Similar to the duck pasta in my last post this is a recipe I have made lots of times so I have played with it a little.

Jamie just says to place the rosemary and unpeeled garlic cloves underneath and on top of the lamb, but if I have time and can be bothered I also chop some of it up and make deep incisions in the meat with a sharp knife. I then push pieces of rosemary and garlic into the slits in the meat. Today I also added some small slices of anchovies as I had them in and lamb loves anchovies. If you don't love them as much don't worry they totally melt away and just leave a lovely savoury flavour.

I still put the lamb, in an oven proof tin or pan, on a bed of rosemary and unpeeled garlic cloves and then more on the top. A whole bulb of garlic sounds like an awful lot but when garlic is roasted it changes from being quite potent to a lovely mellow flavour.

Next it's time to roast the meat. Start by heating your oven as high as it will go. Once it's up to temperature then put the meat in and turn the temperature down. Jamie says to roast it for 4 hours but I like to do it at a slightly lower temperature (140C) for about 6-7 hours.

Once it's cooked remove it from the tin and leave it to rest in some tin foil. Just before serving pull the lamb from the bones using two forks.

Pour most of the excess fat from the tin/pan and then use the delicious juices and scrummy bits to make the gravy. It is well worth making the gravy it is far far superior to gravy made from granules and not at all difficult. The gravy is finished with chopped mint which really lightens the gravy and means you don't also need mint.

Jamie serves it with smashed root veg and greens which it delicious, but as it was sunday. I decided to go for roast potatoes (skip these for a paleo and clean option), greens and carrots instead.

You can find the full recipe on the Jamie Oliver website here http://www.jamieoliver.com/recipes/lamb-recipes/incredible-roasted-shoulder-of-lamb-with_1

Here is the lamb ready to go into the oven




And here is the shoulder once it has been cooked ready for resting.