Turkish lamb pilau

A great crowd pleaser Turkish lamb pilau dish - just ideal for dinner parties.

Ingredients

• small handful pine nuts or flaked almonds
• 1 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large onion , halved and sliced
• 2 cinnamon sticks, broken in half
• 500g lean lamb neck fillet, cubed
• 250g basmati rice
• 1 lamb or vegetable stock cube
• 12 ready-to-eat dried apricots
• handful fresh mint leaves, roughly chopped

Preparation

• Dry-fry the pine nuts or almonds in a large pan until lightly toasted, then tip onto a plate. Add the oil to the pan, then fry the onion and cinnamon together until starting to turn golden. Turn up the heat, stir in the lamb, fry until the meat changes colour, then tip in the rice and cook for 1 min, stirring all the time.
• Pour in 500ml boiling water, crumble in the stock cube, add the apricots, then season to taste. Turn the heat down, cover and simmer for 12 mins until the rice is tender and the stock has been absorbed. Toss in the pine nuts and mint and serve.

To make it lighter: Use chicken with chicken stock instead of lamb and currants instead of apricots.