recipe: cordero al chilindrón (basque style lamb stew) tomatoes & smoked paprika

Lamb cuts #1: scrag end, cut into neck chops for this week's fridaynightdinnerbox. 

This is the cut most commonly found in recipes for Irish Stew, where the chops layered with onions & potatoes then simmered for several hours...(more about this at St Patrick's Day 2013 posting). It requires slow cooking as it is quite tough but this also means there is loads of flavour. Because it is fatty, I like to let the cooked stew sit in the fridge overnight so that the fat can solidify making it easier to skim away. 

Basque cooking is famous throughout Spain & the world over. The food of this region is a part of what gives the Basque country its identity, the people there speak with unconcealed pride about the quality of recipes & skill of Basque chefs. Additionally, there is definition in the way in which food is prepared & enjoyed, an important aspect which both preserves & upholds Basque culinary traditions.

A txoko consists typically of men only, gatherings of small groups who form societies who cook & eat together, exchanging ideas, experimenting with recipes, arguing, drinking & playing cards in a home or a restaurant or some other space fit for the purpose. Practising the dish this week, with my regular stream of visitors, many of whom are also chefs working around Auckland, my little kitchen began to feel like it was my own little txoko, nestled beneath the mountain in the shady slopes of Mt Eden. This communal feel to the cooking & eating of these weekly dishes of mine serving once more to remind me that the joy of the fridaynightdinnerbox project is in essence to be found in the sharing of food.

So then to the dish itself. Research is required, but google Basque lamb stew & the result is multiple versions of the same recipe, a delicious sounding recipe I should add, but this is not where my intention lies. A quick email to my Camino sister & good friend Alex, on location for all my fridaynightdinnerbox inquiries in Barcelona, lets me know the dish I want is known as Cordero al Chilindrón, plus a link to use as a starting point. An important point to note though: these recipes I post are my interpretation & while the internet research will serve as a guideline, it is the flavours of the dishes I ate in little restaurants & bars, the smells that drifted out from kitchens across the narrow streets around Pamplona, Puente La Reina, Estella & the many smaller but no less distinct towns & villages I walked through on my recent pilgrimage the Camino de Santiago de Compostella, which remain with me that will serve here as the true guide for my senses as this week's recipe forms in my mind: wood smoke & grilled meats, the spice of pimiento, the sweetness of onions & tomato, the earthiness of garlic & the pungent aroma of fresh cut herbs all come to mind. Perhaps I will stray unintentionally from the true Basque style dish I seek to recapture here but hey, I'm a kiwi chef! I'll do what feels right.

Ingredients (part1): the marinade:

5 or 6 black red & white peppercorns

2tspn smoked paprika

 1 whole dried red chilli

4 or 5 garlic

a good squeeze of tomato paste

a glass of white wine

2 kg lamb neck chops

Method:

*in a mortar & pestle, grind the spices & garlic together

*mix in the tomato paste, then the wine

*smother the neck chops coating well

*sit, covered, in the fridge overnight.

Ingredients: cordero al chilindrón (basque lamb stew)

olive oil

1tspoon each of sweet & smoked paprika, cayenne pepper

6 small onions, 6 garlic cloves

roast capsicums, 1 per person

red wine, a good spanish red, Rioja is what i like to drink I mean cook with

a squeeze of tomato paste & a can of crushed tomatoes

spring onions, parsley & lemon

Method:

*heat the pan, the oil, & sprinkle in the spices, cooking them out for a few mins

*add diced garlic & onions peeled then cut into 1/4's, saute

*add roasted capsicums, cut into strips, saute further

*remove all from pan & set aside in a deep casserole

* add a little more olive oil, heat, then brown the neck chops on each side

*remove from pan, set aside over onions & peppers

*add tomato paste to pan, allowing it to caramelise a little over a few mins

deglaze pan with a glass of red wine, scraping all the good bits starting to stick to the pan

*add the crushed/chopped tomatoes & cook out for a few mins til liquids begin to reduce

*pour this over the lamb & veg in the casserole, the lamb wants to be mostly covered

*braise this for about 3 hours

(note: I cook this on the stove top, covered, in a big titanium coated pot on a really low temperature, just a gentle bubbling away. In the oven is also possible, covered, on about 180 degrees, basically till the meat falls from the bone)

 

The dish is basically ready at this point. As mentioned earlier, because I used neck chops instead of the shoulder cut, I refrigerated the casserole overnight. This has two benefits, the first being that it allows the flavours to develop & the second that this allows the excess fat to set as a top layer, which I then lifted off next morning. While this fat is very lamby in flavour, there is also a lot of the tomato/pimiento to this flavour; because I hate to waste anything, I see this as a fantastic by-product, for example as a starting point for a fry-up the next day, say eggs & sausies, or to get some albondigas cooking for dinner the next night. 

Earlier in the week I think I may have promised a garlic mash potato with this dish, however  it seemed to me that chic peas were a more suitable choice. I soaked them overnight, draining most of the water away the next day, refreshing it with fresh & some home made chicken stock, a lemon, three or four bay leaves, & cooking it til not exactly soft, but getting there; about an hour. these i tossed with a chiffonade of spinach, some salt crystals, a little olive oil. served separately, I like to mix them together in a bowl. It's a really nice way of bringing together different flavours & textures...as well as, for me, bringing back the memories of travels past...