Every once in a while I rediscover minced lamb. It’s a winner, with its rich flavour, low cost and enormous versatility, conjuring up long summer evenings with a full table. I like to fry it in butter and cinnamon as a topping for hummus, or with smoked paprika and toasted pine nuts to eat with flatbreads and tomato salads, or use it as a stuffing for aubergines. It also makes for great burgers with armfuls of chopped fresh mint. Here I add gentle spices and roll the mince into balls – this is wonderful with a warm apricot- and pistachio-studded couscous.

Spiced lamb meatballs with apricot and pistachio couscous and harissa yoghurt

Serving the meatballs with a scarlet-hued harissa yoghurt gives them a delicious brush of heat and a glistening coat.

Prep 20 min
Chill 30 min
Cook 10 min
Serves 4-6

For the meatballs
30g fresh breadcrumbs
Juice of ½ lemon
600g lamb mince
1 egg
1 small garlic clove, crushed
½ tsp ground cinnamon
1½ tsp ground cumin
1 tsp ground paprika
½ tsp ground turmeric
1 pinch dried chilli flakes
1 handful coriander leaves, finely chopped
Salt and black pepper
2 tbsp olive oil

For the couscous
300g couscous
2 tbsp olive oil
400ml chicken or vegetable stock
Juice of ½ lemon
75g dried apricots, finely chopped
1 handful mint, chopped
1 handful coriander leaves, chopped

To serve
150g Greek yoghurt
1½ tsp harissa
2 tbsp pistachios, chopped
Flatbreads

Put the breadcrumbs in a bowl and pour over two tablespoons of cold water and the lemon juice. Add the remaining meatball ingredients except the olive oil and season generously. Mix thoroughly with your hands, then fry a tiny bit of the mix in oil to check the seasoning. Taste and adjust the spices or salt, if necessary, then shape into 16-20 small balls. Refrigerate for 30 minutes to firm up.

Meanwhile, put the couscous into a medium bowl, add the oil and stir to coat each grain. Heat up the stock and pour over the couscous. Season generously, then cover with clingfilm and leave for 15 minutes.

Once the meatballs have chilled, warm the oil in a large frying pan over a medium heat. Cook the meatballs in batches for four to five minutes each, turning occasionally until brown and cooked through. Once they are all cooked, transfer to a plate, cover with foil and keep somewhere warm (a low oven or a plate warmer). Next, deglaze the pan with the yoghurt and harissa, turning the heat up a little and stirring to catch as many of the pan juices as possible.

Remove the clingfilm from the couscous and fluff up with a fork. Stir in the lemon juice, apricots and all but a few tablespoons of the chopped herbs, and season to taste. Place in a large, wide serving bowl, top with the meatballs and spoon the warm yoghurt on top. Scatter with the leftover herbs and the pistachios, and serve at once, with flatbreads on the side.

And for the rest of the week

Whizz together more yoghurt and harissa with three tablespoons of chopped preserved lemons and a few cloves of garlic. Use this to marinate a spatchcocked chicken to grill on the barbecue. Leftover pistachios can be turned into delicious biscuits or blitzed to make a wonderfully green frangipane. Turn any leftover mint into mint sauce with sugar and hot vinegar.

• Food styling: Valerie Berry