Lamb Marrakesh
“Hi Harriet, Just making Lamb Marrakesh and remembering what fun we had together. Hope your life is awesome!”
And just like that, two friends who had lost touch reconnected over a much-loved and frequently made recipe from decades ago.
“Lamb Marrakesh” was a regular feature on the table when I was catering for film crews and for a time one of the most popular frozen meals I made and sold in quantity when I thought retailing food was a good idea.
In my catering olden days, I used to fastidiously brown all the meat for casseroles which could often take an hour or more when cooking 5kg of lamb at a time. I finally crumbled and started just throwing all the raw ingredients into a casserole dish and cooking them – without any noticeable reduction in deliciousness, not to mention an earlier home time for me. Win/win!
Easy and delicious – if you don’t want to spend time browning the meat, onions etc, simply “dump and mix” the prepared ingredients (omitting the oil and butter) into your casserole dish and get cooking.
INGREDIENTS
¾ cup raisins
½ cup medium or dry sherry
1kg lean lamb or hogget, diced
1 Tb oil
1 Tb butter
2 medium onions, peeled & finely chopped
2 cloves garlic, peeled & crushed
1 tsp turmeric powder
½ tsp mixed spice
pinch chilli powder
1½ tsp salt
400g can tomatoes in juice
1-1½ cups water
TO FINISH
2 Tb approx. cornflour for thickening
½ cup slivered almonds, toasted
chopped parsley
Serves 4-6
DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 170ºC fan bake.
Cover raisins with sherry and leave to soak.
Heat oil and butter in a large flameproof casserole and brown lamb cubes a few at a time. Remove to a dish as they brown.
When all the meat is browned, add onions and garlic to casserole and cook a little longer. Return meat to casserole and add spices and salt.
Add tomatoes and 1 cup of water, the raisins and sherry. Stir well. Cover and place in the oven and bake for 2 to 2½ hours or until tender.
After the first hour, check and add extra water if needed.
TO FINISH:
When tender, thicken with the cornflour mixed with 3 or 4 tablespoons of water, stirred in and simmered over direct heat (on stove) for a few minutes.
TO SERVE:
Serve sprinkled with toasted slivered almonds and chopped parsley.