This Spicy Slow Cooker Lamb recipe is a great one for when you want to be able to put a meal together quickly in the evening. You can prepare the lamb and get it cooking earlier in the day and the accompanying couscous takes less than 15 minutes to prepare.
While I have called it spicy slow cooker lamb, the spice, if you follow the quantities below is very mild. This is the spice that the rest of the family likes and happily eats. If I was cooking just for me or for others who tolerated more spice, I would add at least another teaspoon of all the spices.
This recipe is also a good example of how I am blending Paleo/Clean eating with family eating. The slow cooked lamb itself is suitable for everyone and then I just adjust the side it is served with.
The rest of the family ate it with baby spinach and couscous. I ate it with baby spinach and cauliflower couscous and to add more spice to mine, I added a few spoonfuls of the sauce from the slow cooker on top.
I would love to convert the family over to cauliflower couscous, but am conscious of not making it a big issue, so am taking a gradual approach with it at the moment.
I am happy to make the cauliflower couscous for me as I then use the leftovers for lunches, so the slight extra effort for this dinner meal saves me time throughout the week anyway.
As noted in the instructions, I have learnt the hard way it is much better to work out if your leg of lamb will fit in the slow cooker before you brown it!
- 2.4kg leg lamb
- 2 cups passata
- 2 tsp ground cumin
- 2 tsp ground coriander
- 2 cloves garlic
- 2 cups cous cous
- 3 cups vegetable chicken stock
- or 1 head cauliflower
- 1 onion
- 1 tsp coconut oil
- 360 grams baby spinach
- The first thing you need to do if you are cooking a leg of lamb in a slow cooker, is make sure it will fit. If you are feeding a larger family like ours, most likely it will not fit in one piece. I use a hacksaw to cut the leg of lamb so it will fit into the slow cooker.
- In a non stick fry pan, add the leg of lamb and brown on all sides.
- Place browned lamb into slow cooker.
- In a bowl, mix passata and spices.
- Pour the passata mix onto the lamb.
- Cook on high for 4 hours.
- Turn the leg of lamb over and then cook on low for another 4 hours or high for 2 hours.
- minutes before you wish to serve, boil water to make stock or boil stock.
- Remove lamb from the slow cooker and let it sit for about ten minutes in a large dish covered by tin foil.
- Place 1 cup of couscous into a bowl and add 1.5 cups of boiling veggie stock. Cover with plastic wrap and let it sit for about 7 minutes. Then simply fluff with a fork and the couscous is ready to serve.
- I do this twice to make enough couscous for our family. I have found that trying to do this in one big lot doesn't work so well for me. By making it in two batches the couscous is lighter and fluffier.
- If you are going to serve with cauliflower couscous, follow the instructions here (omit spices from the couscous or keep them if you like a very spicy dish
- Using forks shred the meat from the bone.
- Place baby spinach on plates, top with couscous, then add lamb and serve!
Our Family Menu Plan For This Week
Below is the plan for our family for the week, including cooking for the kids’ lunch boxes. I actually spent most of yesterday making the stuff for the kids lunch boxes and food for me through out the week.,
I find that a big cook up session on the weekend is such a time saver for the forth coming week!
Day | Week Commencing 17th August |
|
|---|---|---|
| Sat |  | Homemade Tacos |
| Sun |  Chicken Wings, Baked Potatoes and Corn   | Chicken wings, baked potatoes and steamed corn Left over mince recipe - taco puffs Oat and seed lunchbox slice |
| Mon |  | Slow cooker balsamic beef with pumpkin salad |
| Tue |  | Pumpkin soup |
| Wed | Chicken stir fry - new recipe to come | |
| Thu |  | Sausage and veg |
| Fri |  | Easy BLT |
| Shopping List | Weekly menu plan shopping list 17th Aug | |
If you are looking for further recipe inspiration, check out my complete list of Family Friendly Recipes.
What have you been cooking up?