Low Sodium Lamb Tagine

A rich, tasty, salt-free tagine. Despite the long list of ingredients, there's actually very little effort involved in this. Adapted from an Antony Worrall Thompson recipe - in particular I replaced tomato juice (0.2g sodium per 100g) with home-made passata (heat fresh or tinned tomatoes, then blend with a hand blender). If you can't wait 2 hours to eat it, turn up the oven and it will be ready earlier. Serve with couscous.

Serves 4

1 tsp cayenne pepper
2 tsp ground black pepper
1½ tbsp paprika
1½ tbsp ground ginger
1 tbsp turmeric
2 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 x shoulder of lamb, trimmed and cut into 5cm/2in chunks (about
1.1kg/2½lb meat in total)
2 large onions, finely chopped
4 tbsp olive oil
3 cloves garlic, some crushed and some sliced
570ml/1 pint home-made passata
2 x 400g tinned chopped tomatoes
115g/4oz dried apricots, cut in half
55g/2oz dates, cut in half (or more apricots if you don't have dates)
55g/2oz sultanas or raisins
1 tsp saffron stamens, soaked in cold water
600ml/1 pint low salt veggie stock
1 tbsp clear honey
2 tbsp coriander, roughly chopped
2 tbsp flat leaf parsley, roughly chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 150C/300F/Gas2.
2. Place the cayenne, black pepper, paprika, ginger, turmeric and cinnamon into a small bowl and mix to combine. Place the lamb in a large bowl and toss together with half of the spice mix. Cover and leave overnight in the fridge, or for as long as you can.
3. Heat 2 tbsp olive oil in a large casserole dish. Add the onion and the remaining spice mix and cook over a gentle heat for 10 minutes so that the onions are soft but not coloured. Add the garlic for the final 2 minutes.
4. In a separate frying pan, heat the remaining oil and brown the cubes of lamb on all sides then add the browned meat to the casserole dish. De-glaze the frying pan with ¼ pint of passata and add these juices to the pan.
5. Add the remaining passata, chopped tomatoes, apricots, dates, raisins or sultanas, saffron, stock and honey to the casserole dish. Bring to the boil, cover with a fitted lid, place in the oven and cook for 2-2½ hours or until the meat is meltingly tender.
6. Sprinkle over the chopped herbs and serve.