Lamb stew type recipes?

[Woody girl]

To be honest neck of lamb bones do not break up much at all. I hate bones in my stew too!
The bones add flavour and I fish them out in one piece before I finish the cooking by adding gravy granuals. Never had a problem with stray bits of bone.

 

[Robson Valley]

I've frozen left over lamb with a poor result. Just does not respond well to reheating.
Best use is to set up a meat grinder, mince it up and make dolmades or something.

I like to batch cook things with ground (mince) beef/bison.
Things like taco meat, lasagne, spag sauce, shepherd's pie, string chicken, etc
In the mood, I have been known to make 8 dozen polpetti meat balls and bake the lot of them.

It's still one mess to clean up so I might as well make 10-12 servings at a time.

I use thin plastic bags. I load those with single servings and flatten them to freeze like a stack of little books.

Labelled left over meaty things (eg curried chicken breast pieces) usually get fine diced
and into fried rice which is one of my all time favorite dishes.
Never though of fine dicing the leftover lamb and into fried rice. Hmmmmmm.
Must have peas and scrambled egg to be authentic in my kitchen.

 

[santaman2000]

It is....
Here, hogget or mutton - unobtainable. US, NZ lamb
But Goat is a good replacement. Not too old though. Tough.
I can get young goat here. Locally grown.

Yep! Goat = cabrito!

 

[santaman2000]

I buy lambs (cut, wrapped, labelled and flash-frozen) from local farms.
A few have really been so old, they might be considered hogget (never knew there was such a word).
Anything Greek, I need lamb and lemons.

I like Greek food also. Your post was the first time I’ve ever seen eat and dolmades used in the same sentence though. The local Greek diaspora all make their dolmades by stuffing them with rice and herbs. No meat.

 

[Janne]

The neck bit comes cut up here.
Not ‘ Guillotine type of cut’ , more like ‘two handed sword from top of head to crotch’ type of cut.

It is the leg bones that are fairly easy to crack open.

 

[santaman2000]

No personal experience with lamb bones but generally slow cooked stew recipes basically cook the meat off the bone. The bone can then be fished out after having given up al it’s flavor to the stew.

 

[Robson Valley]

I use my own young grape leaves for the dolmades, the leaves taste like the grapes for those who don't know.
Lots of rice, sort of turn out like a Greek cabbage roll but a grape leaf.
Lemon sauce. Must be some lamb for me they won't taste like my memories.

Last summer, I snipped off 50 young growing branch tips and steamed them as a veg = excellent.
Growing grapes is a good summer thing to do.

 

[Paul_B]

A work colleague went into goat farming for a while. Males to meat, females sold to milk producers. Didn't last long. She found them annoying animals to keep. Still made a profit and left the sector.

Up here we're in the area of Booths supermarkets. If anyone doesn't know about them then simply put they're a little bit special. Meat is top notch in supermarket terms, veg, tea, coffee, wine and all alcoholic and NOLO drinks too. They started off as a tea merchant selling in Preston market over 100 years ago. Then coffee, then groceries. Now it's spread from Cheshire to Cumbria and across to Yorkshire. They try to buy from areas they operate in. For example Holker Hall and other farms from Cumbria and Lancashire for salt marsh spring lamb. Also, and this is unusual, at certain times of the year they sell herdwick mutton from small hill farms in the Lake District in Cumbria. In fact iirc Borrowdale area.

It's this supermarket that supplies our meat. Most people say small butchers are best but imho Booths are small butchers but in a supermarket. I'm biased, I worked for them when out of uni needing money.

Talking about small butchers. There's an award winning butcher based in Grange, Cumbria who took over a butcher's that was closing in Milnethorpe near the Cumbria/ Lancashire border. Apart from all the usual meats they are known for their game. Must visit them and give rabbit stew a second chance. Skinned my own rabbit at primary school age and my mum cooked it in a stew. Dad cut it up first though. Hated the taste. My willingness to accept meat has increased so I might like bugs bunny stew again. Booths sometimes stock it too.

Chicken liver. Anyone else like it? Chicken livers fried in butter served on good bread toasted is special for breakfast. My Dad makes a chicken liver pate that's more than a match for that made for any supermarket or shop. It's our xmas meal starter. Very easy to make in advance and put in the fridge plus the fat layer on top keeps it fresh.

So many foods to enjoy and only one mouth and stomach!

 

[Paul_B]

Btw, a stew in the slow cooker, anyone else have issues with it being too watery? You need to cover the food but at one point we couldn't get it right. Well my partner, I've never cooked in one. Soon got it right but I am not sure how because it's still got the same amount of liquid in it. It's just more flavour is in it now. Good cook she is.

 

[Broch]

Without a shadow of doubt my favourite 'lamb stew' is an authentic Moroccan lamb tagine. I cook it at home (in a slow cooker or on the hob) and on the campfire in a Dutch oven. You can subtly change the flavour with a different blend of spices and by adding fruit such as dates and apricots - or even honey. You can add chickpeas to make it go further and serve it up with couscous. In North Africa it is often served in a deep bowl - couscous then lamb stew ladled on top.

The goat based version is probably more authentic and what you are more likely to be served in the desert regions but it can be a bit tough

 

[santaman2000]

You don’t need to completely cover the food in a slow cooker.

 

[Janne]

The more veg you use in a casserole, the less water you need.

 

[Woody girl]

In a slow cooker if it's too liquid I add some gravy granuals towards the end to make it less so. It is a quick easy fix and gives lots of nice thick gravy.

 

[Janne]

I use the Wasa crackerbread, but early in the cooking. Usually Rye or Sourdough, sometimes the coarser Sport.
In lightly tastig casseroles, I like to add normal white bread, a slice or two,

All crumbled.

I like the gravy granules if I forget to make a roux,( or do not want to use the bread,.)

 

[Paul_B]

What's in most gravy granules? If it thickens is it cornflour?

 

[Janne]

Potato and wheat flour. Basically starch.
Plus stuff you really do not want to know.....

I am a bit nerdy there, I read what all food contains.

It is quite easy to replace them. Flour and Soy/ Vegemite/ Marmite

 

[Paul_B]

It's just that cornflour used in cheese sauces we make really affects me. Used to think it was the pasta but I have eaten pasta without the affects so by elimination I'm pretty certain cornflour isn't good for me.

I personally never use gravy granules. Don't have gravy except Sunday lunch out or xmas / Sunday meals at my parents. In that case my dad makes the gravy without those extras. He makes nice gravy. Soy sauce is possibly used in small amounts and I think it does work for my tastes.

 

[Janne]

Make a light roux with wheat flour and see how you react.

Mother used roux to thicken most things, She made a large batch, took some aside ( light roux), then continued a bit for a dark one.
She then put them in those drinks ice cube trays, froze, then put in a plastic resealable bag.
Took out the amount she wanted.
I told her many times that freezing would change it, but she never listened. It worked well though.
Robson V can teach us about thickening.

 

[baggins]

I totally feel for you Paul. i was married to a veggie for 10 years, and because i did most of the cooking, it was easier to cook 1 dish for 2 rather than 2 dishes. When ever i went out i would meat binge (in fact, since we went our seperate ways, i think i still do, lol) As was suggested above, i used to make large batches of things like bolognaise and stews and freeze them. You're lucky to have Boothes as your local market, i love going there, top quality food (but not at waitrose and m&s prices).

 

[Robson Valley]

There's a variety of flours, rice, wheat, pea and corn to name four common ones, which are used in different dishes.
The main considerations to my amateur ways of thinking are:

1. the variety of proteins in each. People's sensitivities do vary. Rice is the weakest so that's the first as rice pablum to babies.
I ask guests long before a dinner party if they have any food allergies that I need to know about.

2. The starch grains don't cook the same. I'l use corn flour in a DF fish batter because the starch does not hydrate as fast as from wheat.
Thus, the cooked coating stays crispy far longer. All the packaged mixes are the same as this.

3. Taste. I like pakora. I don't mind the mess at all to make a batch. For taste, I can't imagine using anything but pea flour.

= = =
Gravy. I want the starch grains to get wet fast and cook to partly break down, almost gel-like.
I'll use a strong wheat in all-purpose flour (not weak cake flour). Slake that in cold water, add to the hot pan of drippings
and stir like hello with a fork (so it does not splatter).