Photography: John Paul Urizar. Styling: Michaela Le Compte.
Make Mondays a little easier by cooking up a big batch of these curried lamb shanks on the weekend. Then, transform the leftovers into quick and easy midweek lamb pies using my recipe extension below.
For more ways to make your meals go further, try our creative calzones and pot pies collections.
Ingredients
Method
Preheat the oven to 180°C (160°C fan-forced). Combine the flour, salt, curry powder and pepper in a large bowl. Place each shank in the bowl, in turn, and coat it well with the flour mixture. Put the shanks on a plate, reserving the flour mixture.
In a large heavy-based frying pan, heat 1 tablespoon of the oil over high heat. Brown the lamb shanks, three at a time, on all sides and transfer to a large ovenproof casserole dish with a lid. Repeat with 1 tablespoon of the oil and lamb shanks.
Lower the heat in the frying pan to medium and add the last tablespoon of oil. Cook the onions and garlic until soft but not brown. Add the onion mixture to the casserole dish with the tomatoes and brown sugar.
Whisk the beef stock into the remaining flour mixture and add to the dish. Cover, and place in the oven for about 2 hours or until the lamb is very tender.
Remove the lid and cook for a further half an hour. The meat should be soft and the gravy thick. Serve four of the lamb shanks sprinkled with coriander and with steamed rice, if desired.
RECIPE EXTENSION
Reserve 2 lamb shanks and 1½ cups of sauce to make curried lamb pies (recipe below).
Curried lamb shanks pies
Preheat the oven to 220°C (200°C fan-forced). Peel 300g sweet potato and cut into 1cm pieces. Boil, steam or microwave until just tender.
Remove meat from lamb shanks; discard bones. Combine lamb and sweet potato in a medium bowl, divide mixture into 4 x 1 cup (250ml) capacity ramekins.
Moisten the rim of each ramekin lightly with water.
Cut rounds of puff pastry 1cm larger than the rim; press pastry on pies.
Brush pastry with a beaten egg. With a sharp knife, make a cross in the pastry. Bake for 25 minutes or until puffed and golden.
Curried lamb shanks are suitable to freeze. Lamb shanks and pie are not suitable to microwave.
Julie’s notes
This recipe ran in The Australian Women’s Weekly in 2014 and was published online in 2024.
