Cooking Heals

I watched Nigella Lawson on Nigella Express the other day, and she was doing lamb shank stew, a fantastic dish for dinner parties that is easy to make and leaves you ample of time to do other things while you prepare for the party, without having to stress yourself cooking up a storm (literally) in the kitchen. And you can even sit down with your guests and have dinner with them together without having to toil yourself in the kitchen struggling to serve the next dish. Sounds like a perfect dish for me as I do tend to have dinner parties quite a bit…

So I decided to give the dish a try, but modified it to suit what spices I have in the kitchen. It’s a very satisfying meal and can get too rich if you eat too much though 😉

Stewing takes a long time, but it’s really easy to make! This is my first time making lamb shank stew and couscous…but it turned out a lot better than I expected…both taste and photos! Photos were taken using studio lighting as it started to rain when I finished cooking…bad natural lighting!

Close up photo…

Cooking time: 1 – 1.5 hrs
Preparation: 15 – 30 mins
Serving: 4

Ingredients
4 lamb shanks (rubbed with 1/2 tsp salt and leave for 30 mins – 1 hr)
1 medium carrot (I prefer organic), cut into triangular chunks
2 medium waxy potato (avoid using the floury ones, they get really mushy when stewed), cut into large chunks
1 large yellow onion, cut into wedges
2 medium tomato, cut into wedges
10 swiss brown mushroom, halved
1 small onion, chopped
4 cloves garlic, chopped
3 tbsp olive oil
1 chicken stock cube (crumbled)
1/2 tsp sea salt
1.5 litre water

Spices & herbs:
2 stalks of fresh rosemary, chopped finely
3 stalks of fresh thyme, chopped finely
1/2 tsp coriander seeds + 1/2 tsp cumin (pound finely)
1 tbsp curry powder (for meat) + 1/2 tsp turmeric powder (mix with 2 tbsp water)

Steps:
1. Heat oil in a large saucepan and brown lamb shanks on both sides, to seal and improve the flavour. Remove from saucepan and leave the oil in the pan.
2. Fry chopped garlic, onion, spices and herbs in the oil until slightly brown and fragrant. Put back the lamb shanks, add the remaining vegetables, water, chicken stock cube and salt. Cover the saucepan with lid and simmer on low heat for about 1 – 1.5 hrs, until the lamb meat gets tender and soft, and gravy is reduced. (if the gravy is too thick, add water).
3. While waiting for the stew to be ready, prepare butter-almond couscous.
4. Serve lamb shank stew and vegetables hot with butter-almond couscous. Enjoy!

Butter-almond flakes couscous
Ingredients:
1 cup of instant couscous
1 cup of water
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp butter
3 tbsp almond flakes (lightly toasted)

Steps:
1. Boil water with butter and salt in a medium saucepan.
2. Add couscous while stirring gently.
3. Turn off heat immediately and cover the saucepan for about 4 – 5 minutes, fluff up couscous using a fork.
4. Add in the toasted almond flakes before serving.

Note: The best place to get imported or western ingredients in Kuala Lumpur are at Village Grocer, Bangsar Village. They have more varieties and reasonable pricing compared to Cold Storage. The lamb shanks sold there are pretty reasonably priced, and fresh too! They are imported from Australia and frozen, cost between RM 8 – 15 for each lamb shank…