Thursday, 16 June 2016

Testing - Mutton Hotpot

I'm trying this in the slow cooker, although the original recipe in Dorothy Hartley's book calls for a slow wood stove. Adapted from Food in England, p 156.

http://www.food.com/recipe/leg-of-lamb-in-the-crock-pot-55600

1 - Alright, it worked and was pretty good. I cooked it on 'high' and it seemed perfectly ready 6 hours later. I didn't have kidneys, so that's an experiment to try. I did use vegetable broth instead of just water.

1 bay leaf
1⁄2 leg of mutton (or lamb), rolled
2 Tbsps Oil or Bacon fat
2 Tbsps flour
1⁄4 tsp pepper
1 Tbsp butter
Kidney
2 onions, chopped
3 carrots, sliced into 1" pieces
1 Tbsp flour
1 1⁄2 lbs potatoes, sliced 1⁄2"
1 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp flour
1 3⁄4 cups broth 1 3/4 cups water?
Salt
1 tsp sugar
Anchovy sauce
  1. Place a bay leaf and the bacon fat in the bottom of the slow cooker.
  2. Heat the butter in a skillet. Mix the flour and pepper together, and dust the meat with it. Brown the meat in the hot butter to seal in the juices. Arrange on the bottom of the cooker. (If you have a kidney from the mutton, put this in next) Sprinkle with salt.
  3. Dust the carrots with 1 Tbsp flour and in the remains of the oil, fry with the onion in the pan used to brown the mutton, until the carrots brown. Arrange on top of the mutton and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
  4. Arrange the potatoes on top like slates on a roof and sprinkle with salt and pepper.
  5. With the remaining fat in the skillet, add a Tbsp of butter and an equal amount of flour and cook to brown, then add water hot from the kettle and stir to make a gravy. Season with salt and pepper and add the sugar and, if you so choose, a dash or two of anchovy sauce.
  6. Pour in the gravy. 
  7. Put on the lid and cook on high for 8 5-7 hours.