Hello Reader,

Last night I made a pumpkin and feta salad with some lamb.

Tonight, I’m using the leftover lamb and extending it with some eggplant plus some older vegetables from my refrigerator. I will hopefully have enough food for dinners throughout the week. 

Instead of a traditional slow braise, I’m using a pressure cooker. I like using my pressure cooker. As a kitchen appliance, it’s versatile and suits my needs.

Recipe

Equipment

• Pressure cooker
• Frying pan

Ingredients^[i]

• Lamb (leftover rolled boneless shoulder meat)
• Gravy (leftover and made from the cooking juices of the lamb with roux)
• Hot chips (leftover from Friday night’s chicken and chips dinner^[ii])
• Potato (diced)
• Eggplant (diced with the skin left on)
• Stock (leftover lamb cooking juices)
• Red wine (to deglaze the fond from the frying pan)
• Onion (old cut onion from the refrigerator)
• Spring onion (cut roughly)
• Celery (cut roughly)
• Carrot (cut roughly)
• Parsley (old and ready to be discarded)
• Fennel (old and ready to be discarded)
• Vegetable oil

Instructions

1. Add some vegetable oil to a hot frying pan and gently fry the meat to give it more colour. Remove the meat and add the “hot” chips, onion, spring onion, eggplant, celery, carrot, and fennel. Cook these vegetables until they caramelise, and leave some fond in the bottom of the frying pan.
2. Deglaze the pan with a small quantity of red wine, whisky, or cooking sherry. It doesn’t matter. Water would also work, but I have wine, whisky, and sherry, so I may as well use it. 
3. Transfer the contents of the frying pan to the pressure cooker.
4. Add the meat, leftover gravy, and stock to the pressure cooker.
5. Don’t forget to toss in the old parsley.
6. Cook under pressure for 15 minutes^[iii].
7. After 15 minutes, turn off the heat and allow the pressure cooker to reach atmospheric pressure naturally. The natural equilibration allows the flavours of the foods to combine longer and make this meal an equivalent of a slow braise in terms of flavours.
8. Open the pressure cooker, and with a large spoon, aliquot the contents into separate containers for refrigeration.

Serving suggestions

• During the week, I’ll take a large spoonful of lamb and eggplant and serve it with noodles or rice. One night I might also place it on top of some sourdough bread and heat it in the oven.
• I can mix various things with the lamb and eggplant each night to keep the meals enjoyable. I’ll work that out each night.
• This approach gives me meals that can be quickly prepared when I get home from work.
• If I’m using noodles or rice, I’ll heat the lamb and eggplant with microwave radiation. I know some readers eschew the use of microwave radiation; I’ve read limited evidence that this form of cooking can cause damage or harm to humans[1]. In my personal and not my professional opinion, I remain happy using microwave radiation for personal use.
• While I’d generally try to spend more time each night on a meal, I’m currently unable to, so this approach is what it is. 
• I hope you have a good week.

References

1. Michalak, J., et al., Effect of Microwave Heating on the Acrylamide Formation in Foods. Molecules, 2020. 25(18).

Photographs

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Endnotes

^[i] Many of the ingredients were ready to be discarded. Rather than waste them, I cooked them. This is why I like my pressure cooker. A pressure cooker can be used like an autoclave. An autoclave is used to sterilise things, like surgical equipment or media for growing microorganisms and for food. I was recently involved in a food incident involving poor food handling by a commercial catering company. It was a reminder to think about food safety. 

^[ii] Friday was a challenging day. I was mentally exhausted by the time evening came, so I decided to eat chicken and chips. Chicken from Coles. Chips from the fish shop. Gravy from a bottle. 😉

^[iii] Fifteen minutes is the standard duration for most autoclave cycles. The lamb has already been cooked, so it doesn’t need a longer cooking time. The eggplant only needs between 10 and 15 minutes. Fifteen minutes at standard pressure will kill bacteria, bacterial spores, fungi, and parasites. It will also render all viruses incompetent. I try not to use the term kill for viruses because viruses are not alive. Viruses are mobile genetic elements. Viruses are either competent or incompetent.