This is a lovely casserole dish full of sweet flavours from both vegetables and pork. Diced pork is sadly neglected as a stewing meat despite its being lean, and also cheap. Pork does, of course, go very well with apple - so cider as a substitute for stock is an obvious candidate.

This dish could be served under a pastry lid, but I would opt for it being served with a pile of celeriac and potato mash. Use half and half, boil until tender and mash well with plenty of butter and a twist or two of nutmeg.

Ingredients - serves 6 900g diced pork tbsp plain flour 2 cloves of garlic, peeled & chopped olive oil 6 shallots, peeled 6 carrots, peeled 3 parsnips, peeled 125g crimini mushrooms sprig of rosemary 500ml bottle of cider salt & pepper

Method

Preheat the oven to 180°C
Heat some oil in a sauté pan and fry off the shallots over a high heat until browned, remove with a slotted spoon to the casserole dish, sprinkle over the garlic. Cut the carrots and parsnips into chunky batons. Fry them off with the mushrooms until golden and add them to the pot with the shallots and garlic.

Season the diced pork and sprinkle over the flour. Add to the sauté pan, with a little more oil if necessary, and brown on all sides (you will have to do this in 2-3 batches) and again remove to the casserole. By now the sauté pan will by crusted with cooked flour and caramelised juices - and you don’t want to lose any of those colours and flavours. Add the cider to the pan and scrape around with a wooden spatula to incorporate them, then turn up the heat and simmer until the cider is reduced slightly.

Pour over the pork and vegetables, add the sprig of rosemary to the pot, pop the lid on and transfer to the oven for 45-50 minutes or until the meat is tender. Stir once during cooking time to ensure that the flour isn’t cooking to the bottom of the casserole, and if there’s too much liquid then remover the lid for the final 15 minutes of cooking time. Discard the rosemary before serving.