Day 112: Lamb and chickpea tagine

In advance of tonight’s menu, I was quite aware of Dear Husband’s disliking of chickpeas so I did my usual of not telling him what exactly was in the recipe, other than it was lamb tagine. I purposely left out the chickpea part in the title as I made Lamb and chickpea tagine to be exact. The recipe said it would feed 6-8 people and take 2.5 hours to make but I was under pressure to get dinner ready before then in order to get Baby Daughter to bed etc. etc. etc. so I split the quantities into thirds considering the quantities stated in the recipe as it was the handiest thing to do. The only thing I wasn’t sure about was how to reduce the cooking time as I guessed that less quantities, less cooking time but how much? Therefore, I relied on my good old friend Google and, of course, different pages with different advice. I settled on the one that talked about reducing the cooking time by a third.

I started off by adding rapeseed oil to a small casserole dish on a high heat and then I added seasoned diced lamb. I let it fry for about 4 minutes and then I added sliced onion and garlic. After 8 minutes, I added a mixture of ground cumin, ground coriander, smoked paprika and cayenne pepper. It cooked for about a minute and then into the dish went tomato purée, chicken stock and chopped dried apricots. Once it came up to the boil, I added salt and pepper, put the lid and bunged it into the oven for an hour. The recipe actually said to put it in for an hour and a half but seeing as I was cooking a smaller quantity, I reduced the time by a third. At the hour-mark, I added a tin of rinsed chickpeas and a tablespoon of runny honey, lid on again and into the oven for another half an hour. I then served it with couscous.

The verdict…

Ok, so I knew it was going to be a hard sell especially when he mentioned it would be nicer without the ‘beans’. Uh oh, I thought. As soon as he mentioned the word ‘beans’, I knew it wasn’t going to be a high score. The verdict was….5 marks out of 10. He said it was very hot and wondered did I accidentally put too much chilli (cayenne pepper it was actually) in it. Seriously – I’m not joking!!! I dared to ask would he eat it again and he said definitely not so unfortunately this one hasn’t made The List. In fairness though, I suppose for someone who doesn’t like (a) chickpeas and (b) couscous, getting a 5 was actually good. Sure you know I’ve scored worse! I actually liked making the recipe as it was very straightforward with very little preparation time. It was a blessing that I only made a third of the recipe because, had I have had the time, I’d have made the full recipe and batch froze the rest but that would have been a complete waste and you know how I don’t like wasting food.

To conclude, easy to make, great for batch freezing but unfortunately this recipe will have to find a more appreciative home…or a more appreciative person to eat it!