Some friends hosted us for a gorgeous lunch on New Years’ Day, and cooked this absolutely beautiful pork dish. The recipe was an Ottolenghi one from the Guardian (you can find the original here). It’s a fantastic recipe, but for me, it’s more work than I would do for anything other than a very special occasion, as it involves roasting a whole shoulder of pork before making the casserole. 

I decided that I would like to make something similar, but that is much more of an accessible recipe for day-to-day. The kids absolutely loved this, so it makes a great family meal, a brilliant Sunday roast alternative and an ideal meal to cook in bulk to feed a big group, or just to have some portions for the freezer.

I’ve become more and more conscious of using meat more mindfully- I love eating meat, but I also want to make sure it’s good quality, ethically produced and that I am not over-consuming. I therefore kept the amount of meat in this fairly light, and it is bulked out with filling and protein-rich cannellini beans. The main vegetables in this version are carrots, but butternut squash and sweet potatoes would also work well in this if you want to increase the vegetable content.

I actually used wild boar steaks in this version, because I won an amazing hamper of game meat just after Christmas, so I have the most incredible freezer stash at the moment! Regular free-range pork steaks would of course work perfectly well, although if you are looking for a wild boar recipe I definitely recommend this one!

I served this up with seasonal veg- baby new potatoes, runner beans and asparagus.