There are normally three butchers at The Farmers Market and each month when I go I like to try and buy something from each of them.

I started at the stall at the end from where I normally buy an ox heart. Yesterday my eye was caught by some shins of beef, the meat dark, almost black, with age. I bought one and then finding myself with more change in my pocket than expected I went back and bought a second.

They are in the freezer now. When they come out they will be cooked for many hours with tomatoes and red wine. I might even try have a son to hand to share them with me.

From the Bryn Cocyn Organic Farm stall I bought piece of rump steak to stuff into a baguette for my lunch and from the Dolwen Farm Shop I bought five fat lamb chops and some off cuts of bacon.

I ate most of the lamb in the evening along with a vast bowl of freekeh salad.

I spotted the bag of freekah two weeks ago when I was in Oxford. The name rang a bell as being one of those ingredients I occasionally read about but am not quite sure where to get it from. So I bought the bag half confident I would work something out to cook it with.

Freekeh is young green wheat that has been lightly smoked. It needed to be cooked in boiling water for about twenty minutes. I then stirred in a mixture of pomegranate seeds, blanched almonds, dried blueberries and finely chopped onion, dill and coriander.

It went very well with the lamb.