Roast Lamb and Boulangere Potatoes, Lamb Stock, Pearl Barley Soup

Roast Lamb

Three constantly hungry young men to feed today along with Mr B so tried out James Martin's roast lamb with boulangere potatoes rather than battle with a mountain of roast potatoes. In my oven, for when I next cook it - which is a definite - the first 30 minutes should be at 220 and then the hour with the potatoes at 200. I didn't cook the peas and onions that Mr Martin has accompanying the lamb - other steamed veg instead.

All comments were very positive - nothing on lack of gravy as there was just enough juices in the potatoes!

Lamb Stock
I made Gordon Ramsey's Lamb Stock a couple of times last year using the bones from the whole lamb we purchased. Delicious! Thought I would see if I could get a reasonable stock from the bone left from todays roast using the pressure cooker. Not as tasty but will be good base for soup later this week.

400+g bone from roasted leg of lamb (with at least some scraps of meat left on it) split into two at the joint
Roughly chopped small onion
Roughly chopped carrot
End of celery sticks and leaves or roughly chopped half stick of celery
half teaspoon of garlic puree
1 tbsp olive oil
half teaspoon tomato puree
half glass of dry white wine
1 litre of water (I used water from cooking vegetables earlier)
1 bay leaf
2 peppercorns

Gently fry the vegetables in the oil in pressure cooker. When lightly golden add the garlic and tomato puree and cook for a further 3 minutes. Add wine and reduce by half. Add rest of ingredients, adding extra water if needed to cover everything, and bring to H pressure. Cook at H pressure for 30-45 minutes (I cooked for 30 minutes and will try 45 minutes next time). Take off heat and leave until back at room pressure. Strain into bowl. Pick meat off bones. Pass veg through sieve. If soup is intended use then add sieved veg and the meat to the stock. Either way leave to cool and skim off fat before use.

Hearty lamb and barley soup
When making Lamb Stock from bones from whole lamb there was plenty of meat that could be added to this soup. This week with less meat from the bone, I'll be experimenting with something like butternut squash with the pearl barley, root veg and stock. Will come back and update!

Busy day in many ways. Cheese on toast for supper and cooked by someone else methinks!

Pulled Pork - part of a 21st celebration

Eldest turned 21 and her request for the actual day was for us all to travel miles for a pulled pork 'burger'. Me saying that I could make it as good as if not better was probably only a minor factor to us not travelling said miles (friends coming round with bottles etc were probably the main ones). So now to confess - not that it will be a surprise - that I made it up from a variety of recipes found online. Result was so well recieved that it will be repeated!

Take a 2.5+kg Pork Shoulder and remove the skin and fat (make pork crackling from the skin or discard depending). Place meat in a roasting tray.
Mix together
- 3tbsp paprika
- 3tbsp garlic salt
- 1 tbsp dark brown soft sugar
- 1tbsp dry mustard
Rub the mixture all over the pork. Cover and refrigerate over night.

The next day pour some cider or apple juice in the bottom of the roasting tray to max of 1 cm depth (aim is to add some moisture but not too much), cover and tightly seal with silver foil, and cook the pork in oven at 150C (max) for about 6 hours.

If cooking in slow cooker there’s no need to add any liquid.

The BBQ sauce

70ml cider vinegar 
150ml Dijon mustard
100 ml tomato ketchup
75g soft dark brown sugar
2 crushed garlic cloves
1tsp cayenne pepper
0.5tsp ground pepper

Combine all ingredients. Bring to simmer and stir until sugar dissolved. Taste and adjust (eg add more vinegar) if required. Take off heat

When meat is done transfer onto a warm plate or another pan, cover and keep warm. Stir/scrape the residual juices in the roasting pan to combine and add to the BBQ sauce. Simmer sauce for 10-15 minutes.

After this time 'pull' the pork, ie shred, using a couple of forks. Pour half of the BBQ sauce over it and toss to combine. Serve the pulled pork with buns and coleslaw and the rest of the BBQ sauce in a jug for those who want more.
 
 
Repeated the above for Open Gardens post event bbq on 4th August 2013. Wasn't sure how many I was cooking for so used about 6kg of pork (combination of shoulder and leg), 1x30g jar of garlic salt, 1 of paprika and guesstimated the sugar and mustard powder.  Some left over and now in freezer for another time.

Lamb and Olive, Chickpeas and spinach with honeyed sweet potato

Naomi is 51!! Rather than go out for lunch on Sunday a group of us celebrated here with a morrocan based main course followed by limoncello plum tart and very rich chocolate torte for those who had room afterwards curtesy of Jane MH.

Lamb, Olive and Caramelised Onion Tagine
Nigella Lawsons Lamb, olive and caramelised onion tagine was made using 3-4 sliced red onions gently fried in olive oil with a couple of teaspoons of sugar added once the onions are soft rather than the jar that Nigella has in her list of ingrediants.

Along with the honeyed sweet potato and chickpea dish below this was served with

• a pile of couscous that had a large handful of coriander, chopped, and seeds from large pomegranate stirred through it
• bowl of greek yoghurt that had crushed clove garlic and half teaspoon of dried oregenao mixed into it and olive oil drizzled over it.

Chickpeas and spinach with honeyed sweet potato
Not sure who was the original creator of this recipe. There are a number of similar recipes on the internet. The below is based on photocopy given to me by a chum with slight variations (as normal!).

500g sweet potatoes peeled and sliced 2.5cm thick pieces
700ml water
50g butter
4tbsp honey
salt

400g tin chickpeas, drained
2bsp olive oil
1 onion finely chopped
1 tsp cumin seeds
1 tsp coriander seeds
1tbsp tomato puree
400g tin chopped tomatoes
1tsp sugar
1.5 tsp ground cumin
100g baby spinach

Put sweet potatoes, water, butter, honey with pinch of salt into wide saucepan. Bring to boil and simmer until sweet potato is close to tender. If there is large amount of liquid (which there always is for me) remove sweet potato with a slotted spoon and reduce the liquid to a sticky consistancy. Gently turn sweet potato back into sauce and keep warm.

In the meantime/in parallel - fry onion and seeds in oil until onion is golden brown. Add tomatao puree and cook for a minute stirring constantly. Add tinned toms sugar and ground cumin. Cook for 5 mins on medium heat then add spinach and chick peeas and season with salt and pepper. Cook for a further 5 mins and then check and adjust seasoning.

Serve with the sweet potatoe slices arranged on top of the chickpea and spinach mixture. Decorate with some coriander leaves



Now to find out which recipe Jane used for the limoncello and plum tart!