Decided to make an old favourite of mine for date night with a little bit of a twist.

Ingredients:-

• 2.4kg oxtail (try to get oxtail with not too much fat)
• 200g chopped celery
• 1 large green pepper chopped
• 2 medium onions chopped
• 40g fresh garlic crushed and chopped
• 150g chopped leeks
• 250g carrots cut into small cubes
• handful of fresh rosemary
• handful of fresh thyme
• 6 – 8 fresh bay leaves
• 8 whole cloves
• 2 cups of dry red wine
• 1 cup of port
• 800ml oxtail stock
• 400g halved button mushrooms
• 250ml fresh cream
• 100g diced bacon
• 25g flaked almonds
• 150ml all purpose flower
• 25ml crushed sea salt
• 15ml crushed black pepper corns
• Parsley for garnish
• More crushed salt and black pepper for seasoning
• Olive oil

Rinse the oxtail slightly and put it on a paper towel to dry. Mix the flour, 25ml salt and 15ml black pepper in a plastic bag. Add the oxtail and mix the contents well so that the oxtail is completely covered. Put it aside.

Put the celery, green pepper, onions, garlic and leeks in a large frying pan or pot and fry with olive until the onions are translucent. Put the mix in a slow cooker.

Remove the oxtail from the bag and slightly shake it to remove excess flour. Heat up a pan with olive oil and fry the oxtail pieces until it is golden brown. Put the oxtail on top of the mix in the slow cooker.

Make a bouquet garni of the rosemary, thyme and bay leaves and add it to the slow cooker.

Add the cloves, wine, port and stock to the slow cooker.

Let it  simmer for approximately 4 hours.

Add the carrots and let it simmer for another hour.

Remove the bouquet garni and scoop out excess oil. Add the cream and mushrooms. Add salt and black pepper to taste. Simmer for another 1 hour.

Just before dishing up, fry the bacon in a pan. As soon as the bacon is done, add the almonds and fry until the bacon is crispy. Use this mix together with the parsley as garnish.

Serve on couscous with some veggies. In my case I used sweet baby peppers stuffed with ricotta cheese and paprika.