Tuesday, 29 January 2013

Aldi half leg of lamb, slow cooked

I had been planning to do Littl'Un's favourite oxtail for some time, but the delivery at Papa's shop didn't arrive, and I was out and about at a knitting drop-in but not near enough to any larger supermarkets to go look for oxtail there, so I popped into Aldi and saw a great price on some nice looking lamb.

I seared the joint on all sides and then put it in my slow cooker.  I then quartered a couple of onions, added some olives that had been hanging around - some from the fridge and some from a jar at the back of the cupboard, and then I sprinkled over some ground cinnamon and marigold powder and finally added a tin of chopped tomatoes. I did swill the tin round with some red wine that was already open and set aside for cooking, but this wasn't exactly necessary.  I then put the lid on and set the cooker onto high, and then left it alone.

I was then out for most of the day, which is good as I do sometimes find if I'm in the house while the food is cooking all day I sort of "go off" the flavour from smelling it all day.  I left instructions with GodPapa as to what to do to make the accompaniment for the 2 littler children who were at home with him, as I realised Papa, Big'Un and I would be out past our usual supper time.

About 10 minutes before they wanted to eat, GodPapa toasted a premeasured amount of couscous in the pan in which I had previously seared the lamb joint.  He added some marigold, a can of chickpeas and then the same volume of water, or slightly more, brought it to the boil and switched the heat off, covering the pan.  After 5-6 minutes the couscous had fluffed up, and he stirred through some sour pomegranate seeds which had been peeled the day before but were too sour to just eat as a fruit.

The whole dish was comforting, hearty and bursting with flavour and incredibly low in actual work to cook it!  There was also plenty of meat left after we had all eaten our fill, which I'm planning to reheat and serve with tagliatelle and some extra veg.

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