In Mrs J’s kitchen a certain creative pragmatism triumphs over authenticity, most of the time.

Here’s an example.

This dish is inspired by Corsican flavours, but Mrs J wouldn’t call it Corsican. She would just call it yummy.

Basically it’s a combination of a quick stew of lamb and veal or beef, pasta and cheese.

In this case Mrs J used veal in the stew cause the store happened to have it pre-diced and she was lazy didn’t have a lot of time. Depending on how much you like lamb the proportion of lamb to veal/beef can increase. There should be at least some lamb in there, according to the Corsican. Ignore this advice at your own peril.

Mrs J used almost 50-50 lamb to veal, cause her Belle Mère likes lamb.

Brown the meat with some yellow onion and then add a generous slosh of red wine, herbs (thyme and laurel at a minimum, but Mrs J went a little crazy and added a few fresh items since she had them), as much garlic as you dare (Mrs J used a lot, cause her Belle Mère likes garlic) and some fresh sunkissed tomatoes. If the tomatoes aren’t sweet enough, cheat with some sugar. (Mrs J did.)

The stew needs about 30 min on medium bubble. Don’t forget salt and pepper.

Put stew (including liquid, it will get soaked up by the pasta) between two rough layers of cooked macaroni. Plop some variation of chèvre evenly through the dish. Cover with a mix of grated cheese (Mrs J got a bag of pre-grated gratin mix cheeses, cause she was lazy didn’t have much time).

Then it needs about 30 min at 200°C

Mrs J thinks Belle Mère and husband were happy.

And the leftovers rocked too.