Things are not normal, so I’ve been trying to mix things up a bit with cooking at home to make up for the lack of going out.

Also one of the people I met at OSHcamp last summer retweeted this, which led to me ordering a bunch of meat from Llais Aderyn

When the box came it had:

2 packs of mince
2 packs of diced stewing steak
1 pack of braising steak
1 pork loin joint
1 lamb joint

It got to me frozen, but not cold enough to go back into the freezer, so I had lots of cooking to do over the next few days. The meat went into making:

A giant slow cooked Bolognese sauce (nine portions), which used the mince and one pack of stewing steak (as I like chunky sauces).

Slow roast pork and fries (four portions)

didn’t last long enough for a photo

Slow roast lamb (with the usual trimmings – four portions)

Shepherd’s pie (four portions) from the leftover lamb

Slow cooked casserole (six portions), which used the remaining stewing/braising steak

and that was the end of that box of meat. It’s a shame that Ben now seems to be mostly sold out, as all the meat was really tasty.

Tonight will be kimchi jjigae, inspired by @bodil’s recipe

Taking it slow

The observant amongst you will have noticed a theme. Everything was slow cooked, either in my Crock-Pot SC7500[1] or simply in a fan oven overnight at 75C. As I wrote before in The Boiling Conspiracy there is really no need for high temperatures.

My Bolognese recipe

Here’s what went into the Bolognese pictured above:

2 medium brown onions and 1 red onion, lightly sauteed before adding
2 packs mince and 1 pack stewing steak (each ~950g) which were browned off
2 tbsp plain flour
2 cans chopped tomatoes
~250g passata (left over from pizza making)
~3/4 tube of double stength tomato puree
handful of mixed herbs
ground black pepper
a glug of red wine
1 tbsp gravy granules
4 chopped mushrooms
and then left bubbling away in the slow cooker all afternoon (about 6hrs)

Note

[1] The SC7500 is great because the cooking vessel can be used on direct heat like a gas ring, and then transferred into the slow cooker base to bubble away for hours – so less fuss, and less washing up.