Surprise Ingredient Swap.

You may notice that I missed the "seasonal" bit off the title.  That is because I completely forgot about it when I was choosing my secret ingredient to send to Dom and he admitted on Twitter that he had forgotten too.  No matter - the Lincolnshire relish he sent me was perfect for making a lovely warming comfort food dish perfect for this time of year so I think we managed to stick to the loose theme Ruth had set.

I sent Dom some cocoa nibs as I had never used them and was intrigued to know what one would do with them.  Dom, of course, didn't disappoint and he made some gorgeous rose tea and cocoa nibs cupcakes.  Perfect for afternoon tea - very sophisticated!

Dom sent me some Lincolnshire relish.  I believe this has recently been developed in Lincolnshire (doh!) and is thought to go particularly well with the region's sausages.  The ingredients are vinegar, grapefruit, molasses, onion, orange, dates, honey and spices and, as you would imagine, it does taste very fruity but with a lovely piquancy.  Not too dissimilar to HP sauce actually but a bit fruitier. I usually think of a relish as something quite thick and chunky more like a chutney but this is actually very thin and liquidy. 

Inspired by Christmas dinner pinwheels made by @psychtwin (Tom) at our latest Pinnies And Petticoats baking club meet (yet to be blogged - I'm a bit behind), I decided immediately I would make some kind of savoury pinwheel.  I really felt that the fruity sauce would go best with lamb and I decided I wanted to include mashed tatties, neeps (swede) and carrots to the pinwheels to make them into a complete meal in the same vein as Tom's Christmas creations.

However, I quickly came to realise that I wanted my lamb mince to be fairly juicy and saucy and realised I would never manage to make a pinwheel so I opted instead just to do a big rolled pie, bake it and then slice it.  I'm going to try to do the Christmas dinner pinwheels for a party in December so I'll let you know how that goes.

This meal was great.  The fruity sauce did indeed give an amazing flavour to the lamb mince and the sweetness was echoed by the carrots and neep.  I cheated and used pre-rolled puff pastry but I make no apologies for this.  I'd like to try the relish again to make an onion gravy to go with sausages - mmmmm.  Thanks very much Dom for a very good ingredient.  

Here's the recipe - Serves 4.

Ingredients - 

1 pack of pre-rolled puff pastry

1 tbsp vegetable oil

500g lamb mince

1 onion, peeled and diced

1 bottle of Lincolnshire relish (150g) or you could use stock instead with or without your choice of flavouring - English mustard or mint sauce would work well.

100mls water

2tsp cornflour or Bisto original gravy powder

A quarter of a neep (swede), peeled and cut into large dice

2 large carrots, scrubbed or peeled and sliced

6 medium potatoes, peeled and halved

4 tbsp butter

salt and pepper 

beaten egg or milk to glaze pastry

Method - 

1. In a large, heavy bottomed pan, heat the oil over a gentle heat. Add the onion and cook gently for a few minutes.

2. Add the mince to the onion and cook until browned.

3. Add the Lincolnshire relish and the water and allow to simmer gently for 20 mins.

4. Meanwhile, put potatoes into a medium saucepan of boiling, salted water and simmer for 10 mins until soft to the point of a knife.

5. Put the carrots and neep into another medium saucepan of boiling, salted water and simmer for 10 mins until soft to the point of a knife.

6. Preheat the oven to 200C/180C fan/GM6.

7. Drain the potatoes and mash with 2 tbsp of butter. Season with salt and pepper. Leave aside.

8. Drain and mash the carrots and neep together with the remaining butter. Season with salt and plenty of pepper. (Neep loves lots of pepper). Leave to cool.

9. Add the cornflour or gravy powder to the mince and keep stirring until the liquid has thickened then let cook for another few minutes then turn off the heat and leave to cool.

10. Lightly grease an oven tray and remove the pastry from the packaging and unroll.

11. Spread the mashed potato over the pastry leaving 1cm clear on one of the shorter edges.

12. Spread the mashed neep/carrots over the top of the potato.

13. Spread the layer of mince on top of the neep/carrot layer.

14. Brush a little of the milk or beaten egg on the uncovered edge of pastry and roll up from the opposite end.  Seal the parcel.  Place on the baking tray.

15. Brush the pastry with milk or egg to glaze then put in the oven and cook for 20-25 minutes untilt the pastry is golden brown.

16. Slice and serve.

Thank you very much to Ruth from Makey Cakey for another fun ingredient swap.  There really is nothing better than getting parcels with foodie gifts inside! And thanks to Dom for a brilliant and challenging ingredient. It was lovely to make something savoury this time.