If you watched Heston’s ‘Titanic Feast’ last night then you might have spotted him cooking a tangier in Morocco. If you missed it, then you might have seen Jamie doing it a couple of weeks back. It must have been BOGOF week at Channel 4, and how sensible of them. No point in paying for two trips to Morocco when you can kill two birds with one stone. Anyway, Heston – bless him – proclaimed Ras-El-Hanout to be his favourite Moroccan spice, and I can but reiterate the bullet-headed genius. It’s the business. This recipe would be perfect for a spot of BBQ.

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Serves 2

2 lamb rumb steaks or something similar

2 teaspoons of ras-el-hanout

1 teaspoon honey

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Salt and pepper

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– Mix together the marinade ingredients and cover the steaks. Marinate for an hour. If marinating for longer omit the salt and lemon juice until the end. Lemon juice will toughen the meat, salt will dry it out.

– Get a frying pan (or BBQ) hot and fry the steaks for a couple of minutes on each side. How long is obviously contingent on the size of the steak. A good rule of, ahem, thumb is to put thumb and forefinger together and prod the fleshy part at the heel of your thumb. This feels like rare meat. Compare it with the steak by prodding that. For medium rare it’s thumb and middle finger, and so on. These pictures may make it clearer:

Thumb and forefinger feels the same as a rare steak

Thumb and middle finger will feel like a medium rare steak

Thumb and third finger will feel like a medium steak

Thumb and little finger is well done

Does that make any sense whatsoever?

– Hopefully it does. Anyway, once your steaks are cooked to your liking, set them aside to rest for a couple of minutes and serve with some couscous and grilled aubergines. Boom!