dinnerlastnight

Cinnamon lamb casserole

I felt like some lamb last night. It can get that way every now and then - you get a craving for the taste of something and that is all you can think about. The problem was I didn't know how to cook it. I didn't want to prepare dinner one of the normal ways - I wanted to try something new.

There is a good online site that can help you with these types of problems. It is called recipefinder and is part of ninemsn. On the site there is a feature called in the pantry. Basically you can enter a number of different ingredients that you have in the fridge/pantry and it will suggest recipes to cater to what you have. Although it is not full proof (it might suggest a recipe that includes ingredients you don't have although it includes what you have entered) but it provides a lot of results in the hope that one suits. If you are on your way home from work you can access before you leave and have the ingredients SMSed to you so you can pick them up on the way home.

So I was searching for lamb and celery - I wanted to use celery too - and what popped up was Cinnamon lamb casserole amongst others. It sounded interesting and I had all the ingredients so I gave it a go. I am going to be lazy and not recreate the recipe here but I will make a couple of comments.

Although this sounded great and following the instructions what I ended up with was not great. It didn't taste very good and although it was hearty I could think of a number of other recipes which were better. I served it with steamed potato and kumera.

dinnerlastnight rating: 3/10

Beef Goulash

Rich and I spent the afternoon yesterday looking around Darlinghurst and Surry Hills. Later we went to a couple of pubs for some beers. It was Monday of the long weekend and we were hating that we had to go back to work the next day.

I decided to make an easy dinner so we could sit down and watch TV with a bottle of wine. One of the easiest and tastiest things to make is a stew. I didn't intentionally start out to make a goulash but it ended up that way. It isn't a traditional goulash as it is a lot thicker and doesn't have as much paprika. If you have the time I found an excellent recipe for traditional goulash (or gulyas) with dumplings in Gourmet Traveller. It was in that issue that I found out that goulash is actually a soup not a stew.

Ingredients for this recipe were beef (chuck steak is ok, I used rump), pumpkin, potato, carrot, onion, garlic, caraway seeds, parsley, marjoram, fresh basil leaves, paprika, canned tomatoes and beef stock. I cooked this for 5mins on the stove and then about an hour in the oven.

Preparation:

Chop 1/2 kilo steak into 1-2cm chunks. Finely chop onion and garlic. Cut carrot, potato, pumpkin into large chunks. In a pot you can use on the stove and the oven heat some oil over a high flame. When hot fry the onion, caraway seeds, marjoram and garlic. When fragrant throw in the steak and brown off. Throw in the pumpkin, potato and carrot and add a couple of teaspoons of paprika. Combine and add a cup of beef stock, a can of tinned tomatoes and the parsley. Move from the stove to the oven on 200 degrees. Set the time for an hour and sit in front of the telly.

Check the tenderness of the beef and cook a little longer if needed adding more water if becoming too thick. The pumpkin should become very soft and spread through the stew as you stir giving it a nutty flavour. Add in some chopped fresh basil leaves. Season with pepper and salt and serve with crusty bread.

dinnerlastnight rating: 6/10