Our favourite English mum is back – and shock horror she is using one of our lovely Carmenère’s for the base sauce of these fabulous braised lamb shanks. Now if you get your hands on a good Carmenère like this one you might think it’s too good to be cooking with. Just sure to keep enough to enjoy with your food! Enjoy the long weekend

Recently, lovely Curious Matt and I got to talking about Chile. I told him I was researching an article on Chilean food in the wake of the spectacular miners’ rescue and that, frankly, I was struggling for inspiration. Certainly steak is big in Chile, then there’s the odd empanada and some decent seafood by the coast, but all in all, Chile is not famed for its cuisine.

Luckily, then, Matt pointed out that even if the food’s not famous, the wine certainly is.  This inspired me to get cooking. Here I’ve used Chilean Carmenère, which Matt chose as it will give a lovely rich sauce for the lamb. Enjoy!

2 tbsp olive oil
Butter
1 clove garlic, finely sliced
2 shallots, cut in half then finely sliced
1 tsp salt
Four lamb shanks (ask your butcher to cut the bone, making it easier to fit them in the casserole)
Chilean Carmenère (a big glug)
About 500ml tomato passata or 1 tin tomatoes
500ml lamb stock
1 tbsp thyme, chopped
1 tsp ground black pepper
2 tsp sugar
Couple of handfuls black olives

So heat up the oil and butter in a big, heavy-based frying pan. You can do this either way, but I prefer to gently fry the garlic and shallots first, sprinkling them with a big pinch of sea salt, then putting them to one side while I turn up the heat and brown the lamb shanks really well all over.

Now, keeping the pan hot, remove the browned lamb shanks to your casserole dish and pour in a big slug of the wine into the frying pan (Matt recommends the Santa Alicia Carmenère). This will bubble furiously and mix with all the lovely juices left in the pan.  Now add back in the onion and garlic mixture, pour in the tomatoes (in whichever form , but as usual, make sure you buy decent passata or a nice brand of whole tomatoes – the cheaper brands are very watery and you want your finished sauce to be gorgeously velvety).  Add the stock, stir in the thyme, pepper and sugar and pour the lot over the lamb shanks. Throw in the couple of handfuls of black olives (you can chop them if you like, I prefer them whole).

Now pop the lid on the casserole, place in a preheated oven (about 160/gas 3) and just forget about it for a couple of hours. Lastly, lift out the lamb shanks and keep them warm while you skim a little of the fat from the surface and bubble the sauce to thicken (if needed). Return them to the sauce and serve with a nice minty chilli coucous or some lovely garlicky mash, and of course a big glass of that Carmenère!

Big thanks to English Mum, a shining star of wonderful gorgeousness, who’s very popular foodie blog you can find here.

After the success of matching wine with food for Daily Spud, we thought we’d set ourselves up for a new challenge with another shining star on the Irish foodie scene – everyone’s favourite English Mum!

So she sent us a cracking recipe for Butternut Squash Risotto and in return we sent her two bottles of New Zealand’s finest, in the form of a dry Waipara Riesling and a top-notch Nelson Pinot Gris. I gather that she was surprised at how good the Riesling was. Here’s her full review, and below is the scrumptious recipe we just had to snatch.

You will need:

1 butternut squash

Olive oil

Salt and pepper

7 or 8 sage leaves, finely chopped

Butter

1 onion, finely chopped

350g risotto rice (arborio or carnaroli)

2 litres chicken stock

Parmesan, grated, and some for serving

So preheat the oven to 200/gas 6. Peel and deseed the squash and cut into cubes. Spread the pieces out on a baking tray and drizzle with a little olive oil. Season with salt and pepper and sprinkle over about half of the finely chopped sage leaves:

Roast for about 30 mins or until soft and slightly caramelised. You can do this in advance and allow the squash to cool, if you like:

For the risotto: allow the stock to come to a simmer in a saucepan, then keep warm on a low heat on the hob:

Grab a heavy based pan, put it on a low heat and melt a tablespoon of butter. Glug in some olive oil (about 2 tbsp should do it), then gently fry the onion until it’s translucent (try my trick of adding a pinch of caster sugar to stop it browning too quickly). Then add in the rice, stirring around until it’s all glossy.

Add half the squash and the finely chopped sage. Now just keep adding ladlefuls of stock, one at a time, stirring constantly and making sure all the liquid is absorbed before adding another. When all the stock is gone – this might take half an hour or so – the risotto should be nice and creamy, still with a teeny bit of bite to it.

Now add in the rest of the squash and stir in the rest of the sage (the smell is amazing). Turn the heat off, have a quick taste and season generously, then stir in another knob of butter, and a handful of grated parmesan, put the lid on and leave it to sit until you’re ready to serve. Finally, ladle the risotto into warm bowls, topping with some grated parmesan, and serve with a wine of your choice, or the above suggestions. *Drooling*

Recipe originally posted by English Mum on englishmum.com on June 18th.