Venison Tagine

[amateur]

Our younger daughter bought me a tagine ( a Moroccan clay cooking pot) last year.

 

Usually I cook a lamb 1/2 shoulder in it, but having some stewing venison handy, I tried that today.

 

Here's how.

 

Peel and chop a couple of sweet potatoes and lay in the base of the tagine.

Lay a sliced onion, a couple of chopped carrots, a piece of chopped ginger-root, a couple of crushed garlic cloves and a stick of chopped celery on top of the potato.

Cut the venison into large chunks, dredge it in a dessert spoon of Moroccan spice (available from Sainsburys, Waitrose, Morrisons etc) and lay it on top of the veg.

Sloosh a good glug of olive oil over it all, add a tin of chopped tomatoes (or if you've got some over-ripe fresh ones, even better)

Tuck a few dried apricots and prunes in around the meat and add some herbes de provence and olives if you want.

 

Put the lid on the tagine and stick it in a cold oven - switching it on to 150 degrees C and go out shooting for 2-3 hours.

 

When you return the house will smell spicely fragrant, and the venison will be meltingly tender (if it isn't, add a little warm water to the tagine and leave it cooking for another hour or so).

 

If you want to be really authentic you can add a chopped preserved lemon to the recipe (I don't like them).

 

It's a one-dish meal - so all I added to it was a little chopped fresh coriander and parsley and took it to the table to serve.

 

If you omit the sweet potato you can serve this with cous-cous or rice - but then you've got the faff of cooking that as well

[danimal]

thanks mate, i love tagine

[henry d]

Sounds nice, thanks !

[humperdingle]

Sounds lovely - I usually make goulash, but i'll try this tagine for sure.

[Blunderbuss]

Its in the oven I bought a tagine back from a trip to Marrakesh 2 years ago, and never used it! I've use a lamb shank, but otherwise followed your recipe, cheers!

[amateur]

Its in the oven I bought a tagine back from a trip to Marrakesh 2 years ago, and never used it! I've use a lamb shank, but otherwise followed your recipe, cheers!

 

Traditionally you would use lamb, but this works with any flavoursome meat. Oxtail is good too

[Blunderbuss]

Wow!!

[vulpicide]

That sounds as if it would also work for those goose breasts of unknown age thanks for that

[amateur]

That sounds as if it would also work for those goose breasts of unknown age thanks for that

 

It should work with any meat that would benefit from long, slow, low-temperature cooking.

 

The meat sort of steams and roasts in the juices from the root vegetables and the tomatoes.

 

As I wrote originally, I've had success with a 1/2 shoulder of lamb - the meat just falls off the bone.

oxtail - ditto and venison which stays very juicy.

 

So I can't see any reason why some old goose would not work too.

 

The other good thing is that the Moroccan spice mixes aren't too fierce, so if you have guests who are not keen on curry, this method may be an acceptable alternative

[Alanl50]

Our younger daughter bought me a tagine ( a Moroccan clay cooking pot) last year.

 

Usually I cook a lamb 1/2 shoulder in it, but having some stewing venison handy, I tried that today.

 

Here's how.

 

Peel and chop a couple of sweet potatoes and lay in the base of the tagine.

Lay a sliced onion, a couple of chopped carrots, a piece of chopped ginger-root, a couple of crushed garlic cloves and a stick of chopped celery on top of the potato.

Cut the venison into large chunks, dredge it in a dessert spoon of Moroccan spice (available from Sainsburys, Waitrose, Morrisons etc) and lay it on top of the veg.

Sloosh a good glug of olive oil over it all, add a tin of chopped tomatoes (or if you've got some over-ripe fresh ones, even better)

Tuck a few dried apricots and prunes in around the meat and add some herbes de provence and olives if you want.

 

Put the lid on the tagine and stick it in a cold oven - switching it on to 150 degrees C and go out shooting for 2-3 hours.

 

When you return the house will smell spicely fragrant, and the venison will be meltingly tender (if it isn't, add a little warm water to the tagine and leave it cooking for another hour or so).

 

If you want to be really authentic you can add a chopped preserved lemon to the recipe (I don't like them).

 

It's a one-dish meal - so all I added to it was a little chopped fresh coriander and parsley and took it to the table to serve.

 

If you omit the sweet potato you can serve this with cous-cous or rice - but then you've got the faff of cooking that as well

 

 

I cooked this tonight its to die for, my fussy mother-in-law had a second helping, 16 year old fussy boy cleared a double portion my missus loved it, its on the family menu now

Many thanks "Amateur"

Alan