Lamb shanks slow braised in red wine

In this, the first of my blogs, I thought I'd share one of my favourite lamb shanks recipes. It is loosely based on the recipe published in "The French Brasserie by Daniel Galmiche" one of my favourite cookbooks at the moment.
The curried cabbage is from a "Two Fat Ladies" cookbook and it is a lovely alternative way of serving cabbage. It only has a mild curry flavour, although if you are a fan of curries you could always increase the amount of curry powder or use a stronger flavour curry powder

Ingredients:
For the lamb shanks:
4 small lamb shanks
6 anchovis
2 cloves of garlic cut into 6 slices each
4 sprigs of rosemary, cut into 3 pieces each
3 tbsp of sunflower or mild olive oil (or mixture of the two)
1 onion cut lengthways in to 8
1 celery stick, thinly sliced
750 ml of full bodied red wine
500 ml of lamb stock or water
sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the curried cabbage:
1 savoy cabbage shredded
250 ml of chicken or vegetable stock
1/2 onion studded with some cloves
a bay leaf
2 cloves of garlic
3 tbsp butter
120 ml double cream
sea salt, freshly ground black pepper and a mild curry powder like korma (about 1 tbsp or to taste)
55 gr dried breadcrumbs

Preparation:

Lamb shanks:

Cut the anchovis in half and lay a bit of rosemary and a sliver of garlic on them. Roll up to make a neat little package. Make 3 incisions in each of the lamb shanks and stuff the anchovis packages in each of those.
Season the lamb shanks well.
Heat the oils in a ovenproof pot over a medium to high heat and when hot brown the lamb shanks all over.
Add the onion and celery and cook for 5 to 10 minutes until the vegetables have slightly softened and have a lovely golden colour. Add the wine and reduce by half.
Add the stock and bring to the boil over a high heat, then reduce the heat to low. Cover partially with a lid, leaving a very small gap, and simmer for 2 hours until the lamb is meltingly tender and the sauce has reduced down a little. Turn the meat from time to time and make sure it doesn't braise too fast and dry out - you want to have some sauce at the end.
Alternatively if you make this in advantage you can slowly braise the lamb shanks in a preheated oven (140C/275F/Gas 1) for 2,5 hours. Just slowly reheat before serving.

Serve with a creamy mash, curried cabbage (recipe below) and some of the sauce.

For the curried cabbage:

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4
Put the cabbage in a large pan with the stock, bay leaf, garlic and clove studded onion.
Cook over a medium heat for 10 minutes. Drain the cabbage and discard bayleaf, onion & garlic.
Put the cabbage in a greased casserole dish.
Mix together salt, pepper, curry powder and half the butter, add the cream and stil until smooth.
Pour over the cabbage, sprinkle on the breadcrumbs and dot with the remaining butter.

Bake in the oven for about 20 minutes.