L is for Lunch, lamb and lush.

Yesterday we celebrated Mother's Day. I cooked a selection of curries, some had previously been frozen to free up the day. The two curries I cooked over the weekend were a Lamb Dansak and a Beef Madras.

Lamb Dansak
(Mary Berry version - altered to use frylight instead of oil.

• Frylight
• 1kg (2lb 2oz) diced lamb
• (shoulder or leg, or a mixture)
• 2 onions, diced
• 25g (1oz) fresh ginger root, peeled but left whole (I used frozen)
• 4 garlic cloves, peeled but left whole (I used frozen)
• 1 red chilli, deseeded and chopped
• 10 green cardamom pods
• 1½ tablespoons ground cumin
• 1½ tablespoons ground coriander
• ½ tablespoon ground turmeric
• 1 x 400g can chopped tomatoes
• 200ml (7fl oz) beef stock
• 75g (3oz) dried red lentils - (I missed these out.)
• 3 tablespoons clear honey - (I didn't use honey as I don't like it.)
• salt and freshly ground black pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 150°C/130°C fan/Gas 2.
2. Heat frylight  in a large frying pan. Add half the lamb and fry until browned. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon and set aside, then brown the other half of the lamb and set aside. Add more frylight  to the pan. Add the onions and fry for 4-5 minutes until beginning to soften.
3. Meanwhile, place the ginger, garlic and chilli in a small food processor and whiz until finely chopped.
4. Bash the cardamom pods with the end of a rolling pin to split the husks, then remove the seeds and grind them to a fine powder using a pestle and mortar. Add to the pan along with the remaining spices and the garlic and ginger mixture.
5. Add the remaining ingredients to the pan and add the lamb. Bring to the boil, then cover and place in the oven to simmer for 1-2 hours until tender. Check the seasoning and serve.

At stage 5 after adding the ingredients I placed the casserole dish in the fridge so the meat could marinate over night.


Beef Madras

Frylight

1 onion chopped
4 cloves 6 cardamon pods
2 fresh chillies (I use Asda frozen)
1 tsp dried ginger
2 garlic cloves peeled and crushed (I use Asda frozen)
2 dried red chillies
1 tbspoon medium curry powder
9oog braising steak – all visible fat removed
2 tsp ground coriander
1 tsp ground cumin
250ml beef stock
Salt.
Chopped coriander to garnish (I use Asda frozen)

Spray pan with frylight . Add the onions, cloves and cardamom pods. Stir fry for 3-4 minutes.

Add the chillis, ginger, garlic and dried chillis and stirfry for a further 2 minutes.
Add the curry powder and beef chunks and stirfry until meat is sealed.
Add the ground coriander and cumin and stock.
I placed the casserole dish in the fridge so the meat could marinate over night
I then slow cooked it the following day.

I prepared the spices for both curries on Friday afternoon and had a senior moment - not sure what happened but all I can say is I am not sure what exactly was in each of the curries, but they were delicious!

For desert I made a roulade which was so lovely, difficult to imagine it was diet friendly....lush!


Strawberry Roulade

0.5 SYNS PER ROULADE

500gms Quark
1tsp Vanilla Extract
7 tbsp Sweetener
1 tsp Baking powder
1 Punnet Strawberries (I used frozen summer fruits)
4 Eggs

Separate all the eggs, mix yolks with half of the quark, baking powder,vanilla essence, 4 tbsp of sweetener & whisk together well

In another bowl put the egg whites & whisk until stiff, then whisk together
half of the egg whites into the yolk mixture, then fold in the rest of mixture
Spread on baking parchment or foil & cook gas 4 or 180 for 15 to 20 minutes until brown.
Mix the rest of sweetener & quark spread on cake add strawberries & roll.