Northern food for Northern people

It's a stereotype so often portrayed of us by all and sundry, especially the good old BBC, and to be honest with you it's wearing a little bit thin with me. But it got me thinking about the meat I've been buying recently from my butcher in the town centre. The other week I bought a big piece of belly pork for a tenner. I marinated it overnight in spices, black treacle and pureed onion and cooked it in the oven for 4 hours and then finished it on the BBQ to crisp up the skin and it fed 12 people.... for just 10 quid! The only uncomfortable moment came when I had to snip a couple nipples off with a pair of scissors when preparing it (I can put up with the odd few hairs!).

Some belly pork, pictured during happier times

Shin beef, lamb and ham shanks, oxtails, neck of lamb and belly pork are all cheap cuts but cooked properly (which usually means for longer at lower temperatures) you get fantastically tasty results. Especially as, dare I say it, autumn approaches, it's my favourite time of year for cooking, with warming soups, stews and casseroles which can all be cooked slowly, leaving you time to get on with other jobs or just chilling out with the papers on a Sunday.
Just go to your local butcher or farm shop instead of the supermarket, it's much cheaper for far better quality meat in my opinion. They'll advise you on what to buy and how to cook it, and you'll be supporting your local community too. My late mother-in-law, Joan Duesbury, was a great campaigner for local shops and the whole supermarket overkill thing, and everything she fought for is now making a comeback thanks to the likes of Jamie Oliver, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingwhatever and the rest, as we start to buy locally at the shops that have been doing what they're doing for years, long before Tesco, Asda and Sainsburys.
Here's a couple of cheap and very easy recipes..... eeeeh its grim up North!

Slow cooked lamb shanks
4 shanks
Plain (all-purpose) flour for coating
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 onions, sliced
2 cloves garlic, sliced
1 cup (8 fluid ounces) red wine
2-1/2 cups (1 pint) lamb or beef stock
400 grams (14 ounces) can chopped tomatoes
1 Bay leaf
1 tablespoon chopped fresh rosemary
2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
Sea salt and cracked black pepper
Grind plenty of salt and pepper into the flour and roll the lamb shanks in it.
Heat the oil in a heavy casserole dish on the hob and add the shanks, try and keep turning them until they brown on all sides. Take them out and add the onions and garlic, fry till soft then add the wine and scrape up all the bits off the bottom of the dish for extra flavour!
Add the tomatoes, stock, rosemary and the bay leaf and bring to the boil. Return the shanks, cover and place in an oven at 160 degrees and go for a walk for a couple or three hours maybe stopping for a couple of cheeky afternoon drinks somewhere.
The kitchen will soon start smelling fantastic and you will have a very cheap and very tasty weekend tea. You can pour the sauce into a pan and reduce it to thicken if you want. Serve with either mash, roast potatoes, cous cous, rice or just plain chips and fresh veg.

Beef Madras
2lb shin beef
2 large onions chopped
4 cloves of garlic finely chopped
3cm piece of ginger
Tin of chopped tomatoes
Tin of coconut milk
Cup of beef stock
1 tablespoon of tomato puree
3 or 4 green chillis
1 tablespoon of ground cumin
1 tablespoon of ground turmeric
1 tablespoon of ground coriander
1 teaspoon of Garam Masala
Large bunch of fresh coriander
Salt, pepper and 1 teaspoon of sugar
Toss the shin beef in some seasoned flour and fry over a high heat in oil until well browned. Take out and place on one side. Put the chopped onion into a pan with the sugar, salt and pepper, chopped chilli, grated ginger and garlic into the pan and cook gently for 10 minutes till softened. Add the cumin, coriander and turmeric and allow to cook for 5 mins then add the tomato puree and fry for another couple of minutes. Return the beef to the pan with the stock, tinned tomatoes and coconut milk. Put in a casserole dish and cook for a couple of hours on 160 degrees. Five minutes before the end of cooking add the Garam Masala and 3/4 of the chopped coriander. Serve with boiled rice and the rest of the coriander sprinkled on top.