On Mrs J’s vision board there’s a quote “never too old, never too sick”. And indeed there is no such thing on Mrs J’s mind. This weekend though, she chopped a lot.

Her body is now sending her a message. Stop chop or you drop.

So she’s stopping. For a minute or so. Enough time, at least, to write this.

Here’s a mince mix that involves some chopping. The good news is once it’s done you can use it in several different ways. Could be you don’t have to chop anything for days!

You want to end up with a mince that’s 50% lamb and 50% beef. Beef mince is easy to find. Lamb might be more tricky. Mrs J ended up chopping shoulder of lamb into tiny cubes by hand. It makes for a great mince, but if you have the option of store bought lamb mince, go for it. Seriously.

For 500g of mince (total lamb and beef) you need one yellow and one red onion, chopped.

Sweat all the onions in 2 tbsp of olive oil. Add 3/4 dl pine nuts, also to brown them until golden.

Add the mince when the onions look glassy and nuts are toasty. It might look a bit wet and grey at the start, but it will brown up as the liquid evaporates.

Add 1/2 dl of chopped raisins and up to 1 tsp of sugar, then take off the stove to cool. You’re about to add cheese, and you don’t want the cheese to melt and get stringy at this point. So be patient.

When you can’t stand it any more, add 2 1/2 dl of grated gruyere cheese. Also add 2 tbsp of chopped coriander and 2 tbsp of chopped mint. Season with salt and black pepper to taste and you’re done!

You can use this mince to fill pita breads, warming the filled breads in the oven (melting the cheese in the mince). Some yoghurt mixed with a bit of cucumber is a nice sauce with it. Maybe an additional sprig or two of coriander.

Or you can get some puff pastry and package a couple of teaspoons of the mince into rolls or puffs for a nice bite. 15 minutes in the oven with an egg wash and they look delicious. A great addition to a buffet for many guests.

And the best news is, if you make a few more than you need they taste lovely the next day too, reheated in the oven for a couple of minutes.

Mrs J was chopping, stopping only to go shopping…. let’s hope that’s where the rhyme ends!