Wood Pigeon Stir Fry

Actually a member of the dove family, the wood pigeon is a wild bird which gleans fatty pink breast meat with a game flavour from its diet taken from open fields or gardens and lawns; young shoots and seedlings are favoured, as well as certain fruits and berries.

This delicious meat is best served slightly pink and can be fast cooked as whole breast or cut into small chunks for stir fry.

Let's get frying ...

Prepare the breast under running water and inspect carefully for shot. How carefully you inspect the meat will depend upon whether you've ever crunched a tooth on a piece of shot ... it's not good! Once this has happened to you ... trust me, you will inspect game meat very carefully!

Cut up the breast into bite-sized pieces.

Slice up some stir fry ingredients - whatever takes your fancy, although red, green and yellow peppers work very well indeed, as do mild chillis chopped into good slices.

Prepare some "noodles" by julienning complimentary vegetables such as mooli or cucumber.

Using a hot wok, sear the breast pieces and using the fat which renders out to prevent sticking, toss in the vegetables. The wok should be smoking hot.

Serve with a good helping of the juliennes and a generous portion of stir fry over the top. Feel free to use some chilli sauce or a squirt of lemon juice over the top.

Frittata Pizza

Frittata - somewhere between an omelette and a crustless quiche, firm based and eminently suitable for loading up with all manner of goodies!

Time to get creative ...

Begin with cracking half a dozen eggs into a mixing bowl and whisking gently just to break up the yolks without making a batter.

In a heavy based pan, pour out the mixture over some softened butter.

Lift the cooking egg mixture from the base and gently re-fold, ensuring that the gaps are re-filled with uncooked egg mixture. Do this gently without too much heat.

Once the egg mixture is cooked through, season with a little salt, pepper, herbs and so on and gently cook the base for a few minutes. Take care not to let it burn.

Place the pan onto a heavy board and start to load up with goodies!

Peppers, salami, pepperoni, ham, whatever floats your boat ...

Layer some mozzarella over and place it under the grill to warm through and melt the cheese.

Slice up, as per pizza, pick up, eat ... enjoy!

Lamb Shanks with Mediterranean Salad

Shanks are the tibia, the bone below the knee.

Lamb shanks are a thrifty cut. Braised whole, you're left with meat falling off the bone, deep, flavoursome and beautifully fatty.

Long, slow cooking is the key ...

I use a tagine with the shanks standing up, held in place by the conical top, sitting in just a little water which rises and condenses in the tagine - pretty much, a primitive pressure cooker.

Simple! Just put the shanks in, add water and set on a low heat for the day ...

Feel free to pep up the dish a little with ground coriander, cumin, some chilli, maybe onions and garlic - the sauce can be blended and passed through a sieve to make a really sumptuous gravy.

Plate up! I like lamb shanks with a simple salad of tomato, cucumber, olives (in brine) and cubes of feta. Garnish with coriander.

This combination gives a few offsets to the fattiness of the meat, but again, feel free to serve up with some vegetables and pour over the gravy made from the braising stock.

Lamb goes very well with deep greens - collard, mustard greens, kale, cavolo nero, spinach or samphire. That strong pack of iron compliments the meat perfectly.

For colour, carrot or swede are perfect. In fact, to accompany the simple salad above, ribbons of carrot and courgette would work very well.

Ideas! Ideas!