African Peanut Stew

Just spotted a variant of this recipe which is cooked in slow cooker. The author also freezes all the ingredients apart from the stock so its ready to go into the slow cooker once defrosted. Put it all bar the spinach into slow cooker and cook on low for 6 hours. Add spinach towards the end

Otherwise:

Lightly fry 1 diced onion, 4 crushed cloves garlic, 1 tbsp grated fresh ginger with 1 teaspoon cumin, half a teaspoon each of ground coriander and salt, quarter teaspoon cayenne until onion is translucent.  Add 1 can chickpeas in water (liquid and all), 1 diced large sweet potato,  1 can chopped tomatoes, half a cup of unsweetened Peanut butter (crunchy or smooth) and four cups of vegetable stock.
Bring to simmer and cook until the sweet potato is tender (about 20 minutes). Add water if getting too dry.
Add couple of large handfuls of spinach and cook until wilted.

Serve with coriander salsa. Chop 25g coriander leaves, 1 red chilli and combine with juice of lime.

Note - if using up large bunch of coriander then make the rest into the base for the Laksa soup recipe: 25g fresh coriander, 1 red chilli, 2 garlic cloves, .5 inch root ginger, 1.5 tsp lemongrass paste, juice of lime - process all OR finely chop by hand and combine

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!