Sauteed lambs liver and pancetta

My second post on liver and this one also uses pancetta. The pairing of rich liver with smoky pancetta just works so well. If you wrap these tight enough, they look like little sausages and taste amazing. This dish is part of an idea by Brian Turner and part of an idea by The 2 Hairy Bikers. This will feed two.

300g lambs liver (6 pieces of equal size)
6 slices pancetta
500ml chicken stock
Small glass white wine
Savoy cabbage sliced thinly
1 large or 2 small onions sliced thinly

Add half of the onion into a pan and add the chicken stock, let this simmer, you need it to reduce by half. Add the other half to a frying pan with a dash of olive oil, seasoning and a knob of butter and let it sweat down on a low heat. When this becomes translucent, take it out of the pan and set aside.

Wrap the pancetta around each of the pieces of liver, make sure it's quite tight. Add more oil and butter to the frying pan and give the liver a generous dusting of black pepper. Now saute the liver in the butter on a low to medium heat. Keep turning these regularly so all the sides get a nice browning. While this is cooking, lightly simmer the cabbage till it's al dente. When the liver is becoming firm to the touch (after about 5 minutes) take it out and place somewhere warm.

Add the onions back into the frying pan and raise the heat to medium, now add the glass of wine. Scrape the bottom of the pan. When the wine has reduced by half, add the chicken stock (minus the onion.) Let all of this reduce by half again, until you are left with a rich, slightly salty and tangy stock .Now add a couple of table spoons of tomato ketchup (Heinz of course.) The sweetness of the sauce works amazingly well with the iron tang of the liver.

Add the cabbage to the pan of sauce, then put on a warm plate. Add the pieces of liver and top with the remaining sauce. This goes great with buttery mash potato or just a bit of bread and butter.

Pork chops and potato rosti

Pork and cider is a marriage made in heaven. The potato rosti is Simon Rimmer's recipe.

2 Free range pork chops
2 Large potatoes
Fennel seeds
2 cloves of garlic, sliced
1 Medium onion, finely sliced
1/2 bottle of decent medium cider
200ml of chicken stock. 

Pre-heat the oven to medium (gas mark 5 or equivalent)

Boil the potatoes whole, in their skin, for seven minutes. Scrape the skin off and leave to cool. When you're able to handle it, grate into a bowl and mix with garlic and plenty of seasoning. Form into patties and chill in the fridge for about 20 minutes.

In a frying pan, soften the onion and set aside. Turn up the heat and add the pork (seasoned) and brown. Put on a baking tray in the oven. Turn the heat down and add the onion, fennel seeds and garlic. Brown softly and add the cider, turn up the heat. Reduce this by 1/3 and add the chicken stock. Reduce this until you acheive a good, thick consistency.

For the rosti, fry them in olive oil till they're browned on both sides. Put all the ingredients together and serve with broccoli or spinach.

Chicken liver, new potato and pancetta

This is an adaptation of a Nigel Slater recipe. It uses the cheapest of ingredients, offal, and yet has an amazing flavour. This is a recipe for 2.

200g Chicken livers
100g Pancetta, diced
300g New potatoes
150 ml Sour cream
Dill
Tbsp capers
Whole grain mustard
White wine vinegar
Rocket

Trim the chicken livers and put them in a bowl, covered in milk (this removes the bitterness.) Scrub the new potatoes clean and boil them in their skins till almost done. While they're still warm, break them up with a fork (don't mash, you still need large chunks.)
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When they've stopped steaming, fry them in olive oil about 5 minutes each side. Be rough with them in this stage because the more they break up, the better. In a separate pan fry some butter in a little oil and add the pancetta. When this starts to colour, add the livers and season (go easy on the salt, the pancetta will add a lot of this.) Cook the livers for a couple of minutes on each side, they should still be slightly pink in the middle.

Make a dressing with the cream, couple of table spoons of dill, tsp of grain  mustard , the capers and seasoning. Add the vinegar a little at a time till it achieves a touch of piquancy. Mix the rocket, potatoes, pancetta and livers and drizzle the dressing on sparingly.

The world's easiest chicken and chips

This embarrassingly easy and quick and yet it tastes amazing.

2 Free range chicken legs
2 Large  potatoes
Celery salt
Hellmann's mayonnaise

Turn your oven on to its highest setting. Cut the potatoes into long chips and mix them with salt and olive oil. Put a couple of slashes in the chicken and cover in olive oil and a generous amount of  celery salt and black pepper. Place in the oven and roast for about 30 minutes or till the chicken is crisp skinned and the chips are nicely browned. Serve with dollops of mayonnaise to dip your chips in; that's it.

Curried Lamb Burger

Using lamb mince is a much cheaper way to use this expensive meat.This should make four burgers.

500g lamb mince.
Crushed chilli as much as preferred
3 cloves garlic
Thumb sized piece of ginger
2 tbsp Garam Masala
3 tbsp tomato ketchup
1 onion, grated
Bunch of coriander, grated

Mix all the ingredients together, combining and seasoning well. Squash into thick burgers, put on a plate and chill; ideally over night. To cook, place into a pan, straight from the fridge, with a little oil. Fry till browned and carefully flip. When cooked through, remove to a warm place and rest for 5 minutes. Serve in a roll with shredded lettuce and hot mango chutney.

Speedy poached rump of lamb

This is an adaption of a Gordon Ramsay recipe; I was sceptical when I saw it, but it does work. This is for 2 people.

2 lamb rumps/chumps
Enough chicken stock to cover
2 sprigs of thyme
2 bay leaves
Tbsp coriander seed
Black peppercorns

Bring the lamb rump to room temperature and add to a pan with the chicken stock, herbs and spices and bring to a boil. Lower the temperature to a light simmer. Then poach the lamb rumps for 8 minutes. Take them out and let them rest in a warm place for 10 minutes. Reduce the stock to a decent sauce consistency.

Slice the rumps and serve with the sieved sauce and side orders of your choice; good with boulangere potatoes and green vegetables.

Goan Fish Curry

This is a really tasty curry from the south west of the country. It uses ingredients that are easy to find, you don't need to search out specialist asian shops. It also uses cheap white fish as the base. The final stage can be any seafood, mussels are particularly cheap.

This makes enough sauce for four, you can make it stretch by adding more seafood

Table spoon of black mustard seed
Table spoon of black onion seeds
Ghee or clarified butter
2 medium sized onions, thinly sliced
Can of chopped tomatoes
1 lime
2-3 inch piece of ginger
2-3 red chillies (depending on pain threshold)
6 cloves of garlic
Table spoon of coriander seed and cumin seed, dry fried and ground
Can of coconut milk
200g fillet of white fish (coley, whiting or pollock are good cheap alternatives)
Seafood (prawns, tiger prawns or mussels are good) 100g per person

In a decent sized pan, dry fry the mustard and onion seeds. When they start popping, add the ghee (be generous, a couple of table spoons) and the onion, season and fry on a low-medium heat, allow the onion to sweat and release the natural sugar. When they have softened well, throw in the other spices and after a couple more minutes, add the tomatoes and allow it to simmer for ten minutes.

During this time, smash up, or even better, puree the chilli, ginger and garlic. Add this to the tomatoes. Cook for a further two minutes, then add the coconut milk and the juice of the lime. Cook this for five more minutes. Chop the fish into decent sized cubes and cook in the sauce on a low simmer for ten minutes.

When the sauce has reduced to a thick liquid state, it is now ready. You can cool and refrigerate it at this point and leave it for a couple of days. When you come to use it again slowly bring it back to a low simmer. It can also be finished now, simply add the seafood at this stage. Try and find raw seafood, it is generally superior. Shell prawns if using, but mussels can be left whole, just make sure they've been cleaned and properly checked. Cook as you normally would and serve when the prawns are pink/mussels are open. If using cooked seafood, then simply warm it in the sauce.

This can be served with rice or noodles. I personally prefer it simply with a couple of chapattis, this makes it a much lighter dish.