Mutton shoulder tagine
Slow cooking produces meltingly tender mutton and a crowd pleasing tagine.
Ingredients
For the tagine
- 1 mutton shoulder, on the bone
- olive oil, for rubbing
- salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 1 tsp coriander seeds
- ½ tsp cumin seeds
- 3 star anise
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 2 pinches saffron strands
- 2 preserved lemon rinds, quartered, flesh discarded
- 1 head garlic
- 2 x 400g/14oz cans chopped tomatoes
- 4 red onions
- 2 red chillies
- 600ml/1 pint lamb stock
To serve
- 1 bunch fresh coriander
- 1 bunch fresh mint
- olive oil, for drizzling
- couscous
Preparation method
- Preheat the oven to 150C/300F/Gas 2.
- For the tagine, rub the mutton shoulder with olive oil, salt and freshly ground black pepper. Place a large lidded casserole over a high heat and fry the shoulder on all sides, or until golden-brown all over. Add the coriander seeds, cumin seeds, star anise, cinnamon stick, saffron, lemon rinds, garlic, chillies, chopped tomatoes and stock.
- Cover the casserole with a lid and place into the oven to cook for 3 hours, or until the lamb is meltingly tender.
- Remove the casserole from the oven and season the braising liquid with salt and freshly ground black pepper.
- To serve, roughly chop the coriander and mint and stir into the tagine. Drizzle over some olive oil and serve with couscous.