Food Bites - March 30

• Spicy Mac – Mac and cheese with a twist
• Pesach for the Rest of Us and a Passover lamb recipe – lamb for the season
• Root Vegetables Roasted with Sausage – I haven’t made a dish like this for a while. Time to try it again.
• How to Make Pesto like an Italian Grandmother – skip the machine and do it by hand.
• Ham and Potato Hash – a good breakfast fry up from Simply Recipes.

Written by Ian McKenzie on March 30th, 2007 with no comments.
Read more articles on Holiday Recipes and Pasta and Condiments and Breakfast and Lamb.

Lamb Shanks with a Red Wine, Tomato and Garlic Ragout

Ingredients:

• 6 lamb shanks
• Salt and ground pepper
• 20 Cloves of garlic (whole, peeled)
• 1 cup Dry red wine
• 2 cups Canned diced plum tomatoes
• 1 cup Veal jus or demi-glace (a thick stock or sauce you can make from scratch or buy prepared or powdered)

Directions:

1. Season each shank well with salt and pepper. Arrange in a roasting pan and place in a pre-heated 400 degrees F oven. Roast for 20 to 25 minutes or until it begins to brown. Add whole garlic cloves and roast for a further 15 minutes.
2. Remove from oven and de-glaze the pan, loosening the brown bits cooked to the bottom by pouring the red wine over the shanks and stirring the bottom of the pan to release any caramelization. Add tomatoes and veal jus. Cover the pan with aluminum foil and return to a 350 degrees F oven for two hours.
3. Remove shanks from braising liquid and allow to cool. Refrigerate and skim any fat from the surface. (This recipe may be finished to this point up to two days before serving.)
4. Place shanks and braising liquid in a shallow roasting pan, cover and re-heat at 350 degrees F until heated through. Adjust sauce with salt, pepper and butter.
5. To finish, serve each shank over buttermilk mashed potatoes and spoon the tomato garlic ragout sauce over top.

Written by Ian McKenzie on February 28th, 2007 with no comments.
Read more articles on Stew and Lamb.