Lancashire hotpot
175 min · 37 g protein · 396 cals / serving
Tender lamb, sweet onions, carrots and swede slow-cooked in a rich, thyme-scented gravy under a lid of thinly sliced potatoes that turn golden and crisp at the edges while the bottoms soak up the juices. Serve it the Lancashire way, with pickled red cabbage.
Ingredients
- 930 g raw leg of lamb, lean lamb leg or neck fillet, trimmed of fat and cut into 3 cm chunks
- 2 tsp all-purpose flour, plain flour
- 1 tsp salt, divided
- 1 tsp black pepper
- 1 tsp canola oil
- 3 onions, sliced
- 5 carrots, cut into thick rounds
- 400 g mushrooms, quartered
- 1/4 swede rutabaga, peeled and cut into 2 cm chunks
- 1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
- 1 tsp dried thyme
- 2 leaves bay leaf
- 600 ml beef broth, lamb or beef stock
- 550 g russet potatoes, floury, such as Maris Piper, peeled and thinly sliced
- a few sprays cooking spray, oil spray
To serve
- 200 g pickled red cabbage
Steps
- Heat the oven to 180C/160C fan/gas 4. Toss the lamb with the flour, half the salt and the pepper.
- Heat the oil in a large flameproof casserole over a medium-high heat. Brown the lamb in two batches, 4–5 minutes each, and lift out. Lower the heat, add the onions with a splash of water and cook for 10 minutes, scraping up the browned bits, until soft and golden.
- Return the lamb with the carrots, mushrooms, swede, Worcestershire sauce, thyme and bay leaves. Pour in the stock; it should come just below the top of the meat.
- Arrange the potato slices over the top in overlapping layers, like roof tiles. Spray lightly with oil and sprinkle with the rest of the salt. Cover with the lid and bake for 1 hour 30 minutes.
- Take off the lid, turn the oven up to 200C/180C fan/gas 6 and bake for 30–40 minutes more, until the potatoes are golden and crisp at the edges and the lamb is falling-apart tender. Rest for 10 minutes, then serve with pickled red cabbage.
Good to know
Which lamb?
Neck is traditional and very tender after a long bake; it is richer, with more fat: a score of about 61 instead of 70. Lean leg, trimmed well, gives the same result with less fat to skim off. Avoid lamb mince, which turns the hotpot into a shepherd's pie.
Why the mushrooms, carrots and swede?
They add body and sweetness to the gravy and mean each portion is generous without needing more meat. Leave them out for a strictly classic lamb, onion and potato hotpot: a score of about 64 instead of 70.
Make it ahead?
Bake it fully, cool and chill for up to two days. Reheat covered at 180C/160C fan/gas 4 for 40 minutes, uncovering for the last 10 to re-crisp the top.
Alternative
Per
- Calories
- 83
- Protein
- (39%)
- 8 g
- Fat
- (24%)
- 2 g
- Carbohydrates
- (37%)
- 8 g
- of which sugar
- 3 g
- Fiber
- 1 g
- Sodium
- 243 mg
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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. General guidance, not medical advice. Talk to your prescriber. How
As written, 2375 kcal goes into the pot and 3393 g of ingredients comes out as about 2860 g of food: 83 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.