Gujerati Style Spinach

The boy indisputably loves lamb chops. I think spinach is the perfect accompaniment to lamb as its flavour is strong enough to stand up to the lamb, but doesn’t fight it. Cooking it this way almost makes it the star.

2tbsp vegetable oil

1 garlic clove, crushed

1tsp cumin seeds

1kg fresh spinach

Juice & zest of a lemon

½ tsp sugar

4tbsp yoghurt

¼ tsp black pepper

Salt

The boy is cooking the lamb chops, claiming it’s “the man’s job”. Whatever. This is much more interesting, both to cook and to eat.

Heat the oil and gently fry the garlic and cumin seeds. It’s easy to burn garlic, so keep the heat quite low. After a minute, add the spinach. Unless your pan is huge you will need to do this in batches, adding more as each handful shrinks down. It’s amazing how it diminishes. A kilo, uncooked looks like it should feed a large family!

Turn the heat up and turn the spinach around with the garlic and cumin. Add the lemon. Stir in the sugar, pepper and salt. Keep it turning. Give the boy a spoonful to taste and see what he thinks about the seasoning. Finally add the yoghurt. Give it a really good mix and turn off the heat, as you don’t want the yoghurt to split and go grainy.

As predicted this works really well with the lamb. The boy does eat all of his, though he spends ages gnawing every shred off his lamb chops.