Any of you have bought something from us will know that we extend this to our packaging; we do not use polystyrene foam and plastic bags. You can re-use or recycle the paper and card in which your Netherton purchase arrives. We are told that the slow cooker boxes make excellent cats' toys.
When Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall launched his War on Waste campaign, we signed up straightaway, his words an echo of our own mantra, his voice so much louder than ours.
Naturally, we try and minimise food waste and any leftovers here at Netherton towers get added to next day's menu in some guise or another. The kids grew up on bot-bot soup; a Bit Of This-Bit Of That, any uneaten veg, pulses etc, whizzed up with some additional stock and frequently garnished with the grated rind of an old piece of Parmesan.
As a child, I grew up eating every bit of the animals slaughtered for our culinary pleasure. Amongst the liver and onions and steak and kidney pies, we would savour brawn and pork pies made from long boiled pig's head (to be honest the reek of boiled pig's head resides in the darker, murkier recesses of my childhood memories, even though the end result was delicious), marrow bone on toast, boiled and pressed ox tongue and hearts, both lamb and ox.
In the late seventies, I discovered the delights of lambs' tongues and chicken livers, a taste of luxury and exoticism, attainable on a student grant.
In more recent times, these cheaper, less "sexy" cuts of meat have become harder to come by. With the rise of British gastronomy, the homely and earthy gave way to a different approach, mostly ludicrously epitomised at the height of the nouvelle cuisine wave, whose jus spattered breakers broke across the large white plates of the London cognoscenti. In an era of excesses, nouvelle cuisine came to symbolise the absurdity of it all. Five peas and a smear of purée being the Emperor's new clothes made from vegetable matter.
The financial crash, which reverberates to this day, put paid to that particular fad. Simultaneously, there was a growing awareness of our impact on the planet and a new perspective on all aspects of our lives.
From within this new wave of thinking emerged Fergus Henderson, one of the leading proponents of Nose to Tail eating.
He showed us what our parents and grandparents had known all along, summed up in his own words: It would be disingenuous to the animal not to make the most of the whole beast; there is a set of delights, textural and flavoursome, which lie beyond the fillet.
To be honest, it's not always easy to get hold of some offal, you certainly won't find it on the smaller supermarket shelves and not all butchers will stock it either. We come round to the Catch22 position of their not stocking it because there is "no demand" and customers not asking for it because they know they won't have it.
No doubt a lot of the offal by products from the abattoirs go to the animal food processing plants and I have it on good authority that hearts are used to make cheap mince "redder". Equally I suspect that a lot of these organs are simply thrown away.
Which brings us to this recipe; stuffed lambs' hearts, gently braised in the slow cooker to bring out their rich flavour and to reduce them to tenderness.
If you can get hold of them, these hearts are amazingly good value at about 50p each and cooking them in the slow cooker is both time and energy efficient, so you can feel justifiably smug when you serve these.
4
lambs hearts
1
leek
100g
breadcrumbs
4
sundried tomatoes, chopped
1 sprig rosemary, finely chopped
1 beaten egg
1 tablespoon oil, we use Bennett and Dunn rapeseed oil
250ml
stock
2
tsp redcurrant jelly
Salt
and pepper
Trim any excess fat from the heart and any residual sinews.
Finely chop the white part of the leek and put into a mixing bowl with the breadcrumbs, rosemary, and tomatoes. Stir well and bind together with the beaten egg.
Stuff this mixture equally into the cavities of the hearts; don't worry if you have some left over. Secure the tops of the heart parcels with cocktail sticks.
Slice the green part of the leek and set aside.
Place the slow cooker casserole on the hob and add the oil. Warm over a medium heat and then add the hearts. Brown on all sides.
Transfer the casserole to the slow cooker heater base and add the stock, jelly, green leek and any remaining stuffing mix. Pour in the stock and season. You may want to add only the pepper at this stage and check for saltiness when it's cooked, this will depend to a large extent on your stock.
Put on the lid and cook on the HIGH setting for 5 - 6 hours or on LOW for 8 hours.
Serve with mashed potato or sloppy polenta and a leafy green vegetable, such as Savoy cabbage, spinach or cavolo nero
Netherton Foundry Shropshire © 2017
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