There is so much golden deliciousness in this recipe. The caramelised ribs with their orange and maple syrup marinade, spiked with chilli and paprika and the fragrant whiffs of cinnamon. You’ll be licking your fingers. You’ll also be using these sticky morsels of goodness to wipe up the pumpkin puree beneath them. By roasting the pumpkin to golden perfection first you get that delicious caramelised pumpkin flavour in the puree. It’s crazily good. With fresh coriander and salty feta to finish, the whole plate will disappear before you notice.

I made these for a Sunday lunch which meant the time factor didn’t bother me and as it’s been horrendously cold lately (I’m such a baby when it comes to the cold) warming my house with some long slow cooking in the oven seemed like a fantastic idea. There will be a few more recipes coming this week from that lazy Sunday lunch and the green slaw was a fantastic accompaniment to these ribs. So was the company of old friends, and these ribs are made for sharing in the centre of a table spread. Serve with some grainy sourdough (I love Loafer’s overnight loaves) to mop up that puree and you’ll have some very happy friends.

You can marinate the ribs for a couple of hours or overnight, depending on whether you’re a thinking-about-what-you’ll -eat-the-day-before person or not:)

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

Lamb ribs

1 kilo Lamb ribs.

1 tsp chili flakes

1 tsp hot paprika

1/2 tsp cinnamon

pinch nutmeg

1/2 tsp sumac

1/2 tsp ground coriander

1 crushed clove of garlic

1 tsp lemon zest

1 tsp orange zest

salt and pepper

1 Tbs Maple Syrup

Juice of 1 orange

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups hot water

Pumpkin puree

1 kilo butternut pumpkin skin on cut into large chunks

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp oil

1 clove garlic (whole, skin on)

To serve

1 handful coriander leaves

50g feta

1 birds eye chilli finely sliced

Directions

Place lamb ribs in a large baking tray and toss with the first ten ingredients until well combined and evenly coated. Leave to marinate for 2hrs-overnight.

Preheat oven to 140 degrees celsius. Combine water, orange juice, maple syrup, vanilla and pour over ribs. Cover tray with foil and cook in preheated oven for 2.5 hours. Then remove foil increase oven temp to 180 and cook for a further 30-45 minutes or until caramelised.

Meanwhile, toss pumpkin in spices and olive oil and place on an oven tray with the garlic clove and roast at the same temp as the lamb ribs for 1.5 hours. Remove garlic after 30 minutes, or once soft. Remove pumpkin from the oven and remove skin. Puree the pumpkin and roasted garlic in a food processor until smooth. Season. If still lumpy pass through a sieve.

Serve: Spread the pumpkin puree on the bottom of a dish, place ribs in a pile in the centre, scatter with coriander chilli and feta.

HH. x