Category: leftovers

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food lamb leftovers polenta tomato

crunchy polenta shepherd’s pie

crunchy polenta shepherd's pie

All the years I’ve been blogging, and I’ve never entered Belleau Kitchen’s random recipes challenge. It’s been running for a long old time, and I met Dom over three years ago during a Sainsbury’s campaign, for which I blogged a cottage pie. I decide to enter his challenge this month, and what do you know, I turn out a similar recipe for this as I did for that campaign – a crunchy polenta shepherd’s pie! The power of random, eh?

This recipe came out of The Best, a fairly under-the-radar show that I really loved. It starred Ben O’Donoghue, Paul Merrett and Silvana Franco. I’ve always loved Silvana’s recipes, and found her to be so inventive and accessible. Paul was approaching things in a fairly cheffy way, and Ben brought the Southern Hemisphere influences that set his dishes apart from the others. Dom’s Random Recipes theme for this month is books that need rehoming – I’ve had this book a long time, and while it’s full of great things, the useful recipe quota is used up. After 12 years I think I’ve extracted all the goodness from it. So here’s one last hurrah.

It’s Ben twists that are evident here with his crunchy polenta shepherd’s pie. Instead of a mash topping, the wonderful polenta is used in it’s twice cooked formed: first hob-cooked, then allowed to set so it can be cut into shapes ready for grilling.

The polenta recipe itself was slightly out – I would’ve added a dash of milk and a bunch more seasoning to liven it up, but the recipe challenge is all about doing “as is”! But the addition of tomatoes interweaved with the polenta slices gave lovely bursts of freshness that was very welcome. Under that it’s classic shepherd’s pie really, leftover lamb braised with mixed root veg. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

This recipe is entered into Belleau Kitchen’s Random Recipes #39 challenge.

 

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crunchy polenta shepherd’s pie

Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 2 carrots diced
  • 3 celery sticks diced
  • 1 onion diced
  • 1 leek diced
  • 1 turnip diced
  • 1 potato peeled and diced
  • 3 garlic cloves finely chopped
  • 500 g leftover cooked lamb shredded
  • 1 tablespoon yeast extract
  • 1 vegetable stock cube crumbled
  • For the polenta:
  • 225 g instant polenta
  • 100 ml olive oil
  • 100 g parmesan
  • 4 ripe tomatoes sliced

Instructions

  • Heat some oil in a large casserole pan and saute the vegetables until golden brown. Add the lamb, yeast extract, stock cube and just enough water to cover. Bring to the boil and simmer for 45 minutes until thickened. Season to taste.
  • Meanwhile bring 1 litre water to the boil and add the polenta in a steady stream, whisking constantly. Remove from the heat and beat in the oil and parmesan. Pour into a baking tray until it is about 1.5cm thick, then allow to cool and set.
  • Preheat the oven to 200C. Spoon the lamb and veg into an ovenproof dish. Using a glass or pastry cutter, carve out circles of polenta and alternate slices of polenta and tomato on top. Grate over a little more parmesan and bake for 40 minutes, or until golden brown and bubbling.
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lamb leftovers pastry pie swede

lamb and veg pie

Sainsbury’s are currently pushing us to make more of your leftovers. Growing up, we always had a roast on a Sunday and leftovers for the next day or two afterwards. As often as I can, I like to do the same. I think it’s well worth spending a little more, buying a larger joint with the assumption there will be 3, 4 or possibly 5 dinners out of the one roasting joint! That’s the case with this lamb and veg pie, made from succulent lamb leftovers. Leftovers also went into my L & P, lamb boulangere.

If you’re not convinced you’re going to use the meat in the next day or two, slice the meat and freeze in portions. I tend to measure out about 250g roast meat as this a good size to scale up or down. Then you only need to bring out a bit at a time.

As well as this lamb leftovers bonanza, I also sliced up some roast pork. I made a pork rendang, based on this great beef rendang recipe. And here’s pork meatballs, blitzed up with a few going off cream crackers and a handful of chopped herbs, served with linguine and tomato courgette sauce.

So it doesn’t have to be just ham egg and chips or sandwiches – although there’s nothing wrong with either of those! – but wherever you’d use meat in a recipe, you can probably use roasted meat instead. You’ll be able to make it much quicker as most of the cooking is already done.

Here’s a great selection of recipes from Sainsbury’s for making the most of your leftovers.

Want more leftover recipes? Try a potato pancake stuffed with goodies, a risotto made with stock from the carcass, or follow Sainsburys #foodgofurther hashtag on Twitter.

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lamb and veg pie

Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 200 g flour
  • 50 g butter cubed
  • 50 g lard cubed
  • 250 g leftover lamb
  • 1 swede peeled and diced
  • 2 carrots peeled and diced
  • 1 onion diced
  • 1 teaspoon mixed herbs
  • 1 teaspoon English mustard
  • 400 ml chicken stock

Instructions

  • First make the pastry. Rub the fats into the flour until it's all crumbly, then add a little water until it comes together into a smooth dough. Leave to rest in the fridge until needed.
  • Preheat the oven to 180C. Pop the lamb, veg, mustard, herbs and stock into a baking dish. Roll the pastry to the thickness of a pound coin and cover the pie. Slash the lid to allow the steam to escape, and brush with an egg or milk wash if you have some spare. If you've got some, a little sprinkle of coarse sea salt on top will be a great flavour punch. Pop in the oven and bake for 30 mins until golden and risen. Serve with greens and gravy.
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food lamb leftovers potatoes rosemary stock worcestershire sauce

l & p (lamb & potatoes)

This recipe is a take on a boulangere, potatoes simmered in stock. Made with leftover roast lamb coated in Lea & Perrins what else could I call it but “L&P”, lamb & potatoes. It could be made just as well with beef and slipping a few bits of veg in there wouldn’t go amiss. I served mine with peas in mint butter, and a blob of pickled red cabbage.

I’m not sure I don’t ever have a bottle of Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce in the cupboard. When an instant acidic, savoury pep is required a few splashes brings something to life. When there’s leftovers tasting a little flat or sad, L&P is a great standby.

If you’re looking for more inspiration, check out the Lea and Perrins Worcestershire Sauce YouTube channel. And here are those Sorted chaps making a spaghetti bolognese with it.

Those links up there are sponsored, but don’t let that distract you from a great lamb & potatoes recipe.

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l & p (lamb & potatoes)

Author Gary @ BigSpud

Ingredients

  • 250 g leftover roast lamb
  • 750 g white potatoes thinly sliced
  • 1 sprig rosemary very finely chopped
  • About 10 tablespoons Lea & Perrins Worcestershire sauce
  • 400 ml hot chicken stock

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 180C and get a frying pan over a high heat.
  • Add a dash of oil, add the rosemary and the lamb and stir fry for a minute. Splash over the Worcestershire sauce and kep shaking and stirring the pan to coat the meat in a sticky glaze. When the lamb is sticky, remove from the pan.
  • In a baking dish put a layer of half of the potatoes and season well. Add the lamb over the top, then another layer of potatoes and season again. Add the stock until just reaching the tops of the potatoes, cover with foil and bake for about 30 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for another 15 minutes, or until the potatoes are tender.
Categories
cheese food leftovers olives potatoes veal

veal potato pancake

Got veal leftovers? I do. This is a great potato pancake recipe that works with any cold meat, or even without!

I’ve tried making rosti before and never achieved decent results: soggy, or tasteless, or not quite cooked enough but this recipe from Alex Mackay is the business. I’ve cooked it twice now and it’s pleasingly consistent. It’s another recipe from Everybody Everyday. His version is with roast chicken but the excellent veal (from Farmer’s Choice) tastes just fine.

Veal potato pancake (serves 2):

700g floury potatoes

150g cooked veal, diced

8 sundried tomatoes, sliced

50g mozzarella, diced

20g cheddar, grated

2 spring onions, sliced

14 black olives, diced

40g butter

  1. Preheat the oven to 200°C. Peel the potatoes and grate them into a tea towel. Gather up the tea towel and squeeze as much liquid as you can out of them. Season the potato really well.
  2. Get a frying pan super-hot and add a little oil. Add half the potato into the pan and pack down with a fish slice. Combine the veal tomatoes, cheeses, onions and olives in a bowl and season. Layer this mixture on top of the potato, then add the remaining potato on top. Press it down and dot half the butter around the edge of the pancake. Fry for a couple of minutes until golden.
  3. Using a plate flip the pancake over and slide the raw side back into the pan. Add the remaining butter around the edges and transfer to the over. Bake for 15 minutes or until the potato is cooked through. Serve with a fried egg and gravy.
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