23 February 2011

Spicy Moroccan Lamb Soup


Sometimes the bags of bones in our freezer compartment, compliments of our farmer son, get confused when I forget to label them. So when he stopped by one day I asked him to ID some of the mystery bones.

The big flat ones turned out to be lamb and ended up as a spicy Moroccan soup. But to get to that point, I had to first roast them. They made the house smell savory while they were roasting on a bed of carrots, celery, and onion. After a couple of hours at 400 degrees, the bones were ready to go into a soup pot.

The next step was to put everything from the roasting pan into the soup pot, deglaze the pan, and cover the bones with water. They cooked for several more hours; then I put the pot out on the screen porch so the broth could chill. Once it was cool enough to scoop off the fat, it was time to make the soup.

The bones did not contribute significant meat to this dish so they were discarded in favor of the stock. This recipe can also be made starting with 1 pound of lamb (shank, shoulder, or stew can work, in which case the meat would be browned first in the soup pot). If starting with meat, then the soup will need to be skimmed of fat and the meat taken off the bone before the final steps. In place of the above, bones leftover from a lamb dinner can also be turned into soup-base by simmering them with an onion, carrots, and celery to create stock.

The painting is of Longmeadow Farm sheep before they became soup.

Ingredients
3 Tbsp butter
2 onions, chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped fine
1 tsp turmeric
1 tsp chopped ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
1 19 ounce can chick peas, drained
¾ cup dried lentils
1 large can chopped tomatoes
8 cups lamb stock
½ cup chopped cilantro, or two Tbsp cilantro pesto
salt and pepper
1 cup yogurt

Directions
  1. Melt butter and cook onions and celery with turmeric, ginger, and cinnamon until vegetables are slightly wilted and spices give off scent, 5-10 minutes.
  2. Add chick-peas, lentils, tomatoes, and lamb stock and cook until lentils are tender, about 30 minutes.
  3. Add cilantro and yogurt, adjust salt and pepper.