Lancashire Hotpot

I made this lovely version of a Lancashire hotpot today because I'm not very experienced with cooking lamb and it's a really easy way to cook it. The preparation takes about 20 minutes and the rest of the cooking is done in the pot and you can pretty much forget about it while you get on with other things. I hate eating lamb which is dry and tough so this recipe is a winner and the lamb will just melt in your mouth...

You Will Need:

800-900g (2lbs) of lamb neck fillet and shoulder steak chopped into medium sized chunks (I like to use a mix of the two but whichever cuts you prefer is fine.
1 tbsp vegetable oil
2 medium onions or 1 very large onion sliced into 2 cm wedges
2-3 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 tbsp plain flour
570ml or 1 pint of hot water wit 1 tsp of Worcester sauce added
1 bay leaf
2-3 sprigs of fresh thyme
a little chopped fresh rosemary
4- 5 large potatoes cut into 1 cm slices ( I used Maris Piper)
sea salt and freshly milled black pepper
some butter

Pre-heat your oven to 170C/325F/as mark 3. Apply a layer of sliced potato to the bottom of a 2.5-3.5l casserole dish. Trim the lamb chunks of excess fat and pat dry with a paper towel. In a large frying pan heat the oil and about a tsp of butter until it's very hot then fry your lamb pieces until they are lovely and brown. Add the browned lamb on top of your potato slices in the casserole dish.

Next add your onions and garlic to the frying pan you used to brown off the meat. Fry until the onions start turning brown adding a little more butter if needed. Now add the flour and stir to soak up the juices then slowly add the pint of water with worcester sauce stirring all the time until smoothly blended. Season with salt and pepper and bring to simmering point.

Throw a couple of sprigs of thyme and the chopped rosemary on top of the meat and then pour on the gravy you've just made. Add another sprig of thyme and a bay leaf. Arrange the potatoes slices on top in an overlapping pattern.

Season the potatos with salt and pepper and add a few dots of butter here and there. Place the lid on the casserole dish then cook in the oven for one and a half hours. Then remove the lid and continue to cook for another 50 minutes. If the potatoes aren't browned enough or if you want them really crispy, simply brush with a little butter and place under a hot grill until really brown and crispy. Remove the bay leaf and thyme before serving.

Extra Tip:

It's lovely to have a slice of bread and butter to go with this to mop up all the gravy when you're done! mmmm comfort food!

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