Slow Cooked Tagine
This recipe is packed full of wonderful spices and warming flavours. It’s best served with a bowl of herby couscous.
Ingredients (serves 4)
500g diced lamb shoulder
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 large onion, sliced
1 red pepper sliced
4 cloves of garlic
1 tablespoon turmeric
2 teaspoons ground cumin
2 teaspoons ground coriander
2 teaspoons paprika
50g halved dried apricots or dates
1 red chilli, chopped, remove the seeds if you don’t want it too hot!
400g tin chickpeas
800g canned chopped tomatoes
400ml water
1 lamb stock cube
Salt and pepper
Optional 20g ground almonds and a few flaked almonds
Plain Greek yoghurt to serve
Method
Pre-heat the oven to 160C.
In a large pan heat the oil over a medium heat. Add the sliced onions to the pan and cook gently for around 10 minutes, stirring frequently to stop them from burning. You want them to be a nice golden colour.
Add the lamb and allow to colour all over for around 10 minutes. Add the red pepper, spices, chilli and garlic and allow to toast for a couple of minutes, being careful not to let the garlic catch and burn or it’ll go bitter.
Add the tomatoes, chickpeas, dried fruit, stock cube and water and season to taste.
Allow to come to the boil then transfer to a tagine or suitable lidded casserole dish.
Pop the tagine in the oven and leave to cook for at least 4 hours or longer if you can. Keep checking the tagine every couple of hours to check the level of liquid, if it’s too dry add a little more water.
Once the cooking time is up, you can stir in the ground almonds, these add a lovely richness to the tagine and also thicken it up if it needs it. Sprinkle over the flaked almonds and serve with a nice dollop of cooling Greek yoghurt.
Recipe courtesy of Honeywell’s Butchers.
honeywellfarmshop.com
