After having lived here in lovely Wales for more than two years now, I finally managed to cook our national dish, dear friends: lamb cawl. It’s wonderful comfort food for winter, it’s easy to do, and it’s very healthy with all the vegetables!
Now, as we recently learned in my Welsh course, cawl can mean both ‘stew’ and ‘soup’ – it basically depends on how much water you put in it. So, for a cold winter evening, you’ll probably want to make a really thick stew-like cawl to warm and fill you! Here are the ingredients for 4-6 people:
600-800g lamb leg or shoulder, 4 big potatoes, 4 carrots, ½ swede (turnip), 2 parsnips, 2-3 leeks, fresh parsley, 2tbsp flour, salt, pepper, oil
Cut the meat into chunks, heat up oil in a big pot, place the meat in it and sprinkle it with 1tbst flour. Turn the meat around, sprinkle with another tbsp flour, cook for 3-4 minutes stirring regularly; then add 1l water, salt and pepper and let simmer for 10 minutes.
Peel the swede with a sharp knife, then chop off slice by slice (they’re tough things, so you can’t cut off too much at once) and add to the meat. Slice the carrots, parsnips and leeks and add them, then peel and quarter the potatoes and add as well. Add another litre of water, put the lid on and simmer on a medium flame for 2 – 2 ½ hours. Stir regularly and add more water if necessary.
Serve piping hot with the chopped parsley on top, with rustic bread and Caerphilly cheese or other hard British cheese like Cheshire or Lancashire (you can crumble the cheese over the cawl, too, if you like) – and, of course, a nice bottle of apple cider!
Mwynhewch eich bwyd – enjoy your meal!
Roberta Franklin 