Lamb and rose stuffed quails with harissa and apricots

Quails are popular in France and available in the supermarkets all year. Easy to ignore because of their diminutive size they do offer a delicious meal though you normally need two per person.

This recipe come from a London chef, Yotam Ottolenghi, who was born and grew up in Jerusalem and the influences of the middle east show in his cooking. He writes regularly in the Guardian newspaper and, to be honest, we’ve not tried any of his recipes before because; a) they often seemed too cheffy and time consuming for the home cook, and b) he uses ingredients that aren’t readily available outside the metropolis of large cities like London. However, we spotted this recipe at the weekend and it seemed quite easy and with ingredients readily available – though would you believe we scoured the local supermarket and their wasn’t a dried rose petal in sight!

We had friends over for a meal last night and this is what we cooked, minus the rose petals and rose water – they were really delicious and we added to the stuffing some of our favourite Seasoned Pioneers ras-el-hanout spice which has rose petals in it. If we ever get the chance to buy the rose petals it would be interesting to see what difference it would make.

It may seem a strange combination poultry and lamb but it works so do try it.

The recipe given by Ottolenghi is for 6, which seems an odd number to choose. We made the full recipe of stuffing (which was easier than trying to scale it down) which leaves some over and we plan to use it for another meal later in the week – meatballs or koftas perhaps?

serves 6

150g dried apricots
400g minced lamb
150g fresh white breadcrumbs  
2 tsp ground cinnamon
2 tsp grated lemon zest
4 garlic cloves, peeled and crushed
20g chopped parsley
40g chopped coriander
3 tsp dried rose petals
Salt and black pepper
12 medium-sized quails
1 tbsp olive oil
3 tbsp harissa paste
2 tbsp rosewater
2½ tbsp lemon juice
2 tbsp honey

Finely chop 30g of the apricots and put them in a bowl with the lamb, breadcrumbs, cinnamon, lemon zest, garlic, parsley, half the coriander, a teaspoon of rose petals, a teaspoon of salt and plenty of black pepper. Mix well and stuff into the quails.

In another bowl, mix the oil, harissa, rosewater, lemon juice, honey, three-quarters of a teaspoon of salt and some pepper. Rub this all over the quails and marinate in the fridge for at least two hours, and preferably overnight.

Heat the oven to 200C/390F/gas mark 6. Put the quails breast side down in a roasting tray large enough to hold them snugly. Pour over any marinade and 150ml water, cover with foil and roast for 25 minutes.

Meanwhile, cut the remaining apricots into 0.5cm-thick slices and, once the 25 minutes are up, add to the pan. Turn over the quails, return to the oven uncovered, and roast for 20-30 minutes more, until cooked. Remove the quails from the pan and keep them covered in a large bowl.

Tip the sauce from the tray into a medium saucepan and simmer for three to five minutes, until thick. Pour over the quails, add the rest of the coriander and stir to coat. Place the birds on a platter, sprinkle with the remaining rose petals and serve.

couscous with toasted seeds, almonds and pomegranate

We served it with couscous to which we added a mixture of toasted seeds and flaked almonds and to emphasise the middle eastern we stirred in pomegranate seeds and some chopped coriander.

Apricot frangipane

Everyone loves pudding, right? Well, judging by the response to the blogs we post they do which is a little unfortunate as we don’t eat puddings unless we are entertaining so you won’t find many pudding posts here. But we can redress that a little with this recipe which we served last night.

Just after we arrived, when John was in Canada visiting family, Derek was invited to a bbq by a French/ English couple and offered to take a pudding. Never shy to step into the unknown, he made this apricot frangipane never having made it before. Most of the other guests at the bbq were french neighbours of our friends and they were very complimentary about the pudding and wanted to know who had made it. They couldn’t quite believe that it was made by a man and an English man at that!

The original recipe was for an apricot frangipane tart but Derek thought that pastry and cake together was a bit too much so made it without the pastry. We are giving you the full recipe and you can decide to go with the pastry or not as you wish. Frangipane, being almond based, goes with all stone fruit so it works equally well with cherries, plums, peaches etc. Out of season you could substitute canned fruit for fresh. We’ve mentioned before the difference that using freshly ground almonds makes so if you have the time and means then do grind your own (no need to skin them) rather than buying ready ground.

serves 10 (or less depending on how big a slice of cake you like!)

For the crust
350g plain flour
Pinch of salt
175g unsalted butter
100g icing sugar, sieved
3 egg yolks, lightly beaten
Zest of a lemon

For the filling
200g unsalted butter, softened
200g caster sugar
4 eggs, lightly beaten
1 tbsp amaretto (optional)
250g ground almonds
50g plain flour
10-12 ripe apricots, halved and stoned

First, make the sweet pastry. Put the flour, salt and butter in a food processor and pulse until the mixture resembles coarse breadcrumbs. Add the sugar, then the egg yolks and lemon zest. Pulse until just combined and pulling away from the edge of the bowl. Wrap in clingfilm and chill for at least an hour.
Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/ gas mark 4. Lightly grease a 28cm loose-bottomed flan tin and coarsely grate the pastry directly into it. Press evenly into the sides and base, line with greaseproof paper, fill with baking beans or dried pulses, and blind bake for 20 minutes. Remove the paper and beans, and bake for five minutes more. Remove and leave to cool.

Reduce the oven temperature to 150C/300F/gas mark 3. To make the filling, beat together the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add the eggs, a little at a time, beating after each addition. Beat in the amaretto, if using. In a separate bowl, whisk together the almonds and flour, then beat this into the butter mixture.
Spread the almond mixture over the tart base. Top with the apricots, cut side down, cramming them in so there is little space between them. Bake for 45-50 minutes, until puffed up and golden. Serve warm or cold, with some thick pouring cream.

If, like us, you leave out the pastry then use the same 28cm tin and lightly grease the bottom and sides with butter before spreading the frangipane mixture into the tin and topping with the fruit. The apricots we bought in the market yesterday were very large and so we sliced them into 8ths and set them on edge in circles to fill the tin.

While lovely as a pudding it would also be good to eat as a cake.