Cold night stew

Probably every amateur cook  has heard of Julia Child's Boeuf Bourguignon.  It's a stew with beef and carrots cooked in a red wine broth. Following her recipe exactly is a lot of work with a lot of ingredients.  This variation was easy and satisfying on a cold winter night.

A note: cooking shows sometimes pretentiously advise cooks to "never use a wine you wouldn't drink".  It's implied that using cheap red wine (CRW) will not taste good.  These same people will moan about how the complex flavors of wine will be destroyed if the wine is allowed in an environment that is more than 80 degrees.  I use the cheap stuff for cooking , but then I'll also drink it.

Recipe #49  CRW Beef Stew

1-1.5 pounds beef chuck
1 pound carrots
1 diced onion
1 rib of celery - diced
1/4 cup flour
1 or 2 cups red wine
1 can beef broth (or two cups water)
salt and pepper
Herbs de Provence
Mashed potatoes 2-4 servings
1 package frozen pearl onions (10 ounces)

Cut the beef into uniform chunks.  Brown the meat in a little oil.  Lots of brown stuff (fond) on the bottom if the pan leads to good flavor so don't crowd the meat.  I browned mine in three batches. 


Remove the meat and cook the diced onion and celery.  Scrape up the fond.  Add the meat back into the pot and stir in the flour.   Keeping stirring until the flour disappears.




  Add carrots.  Add the wine, broth, and/or enough water to cover the ingredients. Let the pot simmer for a couple of hours until the meat is tender.  This can be done ahead of time and the pot reheated.

Heat a bit of oil in a non-stick fry pan and add the pearl onions.  Stir them around the pan until they brown.





Put a mound of mashed potatoes in a bowl. (I used left-overs, but the combination was so good I would do it even if I had to cook some potatoes.)  Ladle stew on/around the .potatoes.  Put a couple of tablespoons of the hot, browned onions on top. Eat.

Ratatouille - the Recipe

Last week I reviewed the movie Ratatouille. The movie features a dish made for a food critic. The dish brings back memories of his childhood in the countryside. It is a vegetable stew prepared in farm kitchens, with fresh vegetables. Like our own pots of chili, each family had its own variation. There are hundreds of recipes available, but the basics are simple. It is hard to do this dish wrong.

Recipe #8 - Ratatouille

1 small eggplant
2 small zucchini squash
2small or 1 medium onion
2-4 tomatoes
2-4 cloves of garlic
Some bell pepper or hot pepper
Olive oil
Thyme, basil, salt pepper
Shredded Parmesan cheese

Some recipes call for separate cooking of the vegetables, sautéing them in sequence. But keeping the Grand Life tradition of easy recipes, I opted for a one pot -one time cooking scheme. Start with roughly equal amounts of the basic vegetables. Slice the zucchini into quarter inch rounds. Cut other vegetables to a similar size.

Coat an oven proof pan with olive oil. Distribute the vegetables in alternating layers. Add a little chopped garlic and spices to each layer. Drizzle olive oil over the top of the mixture. Cover the pan with a piece of parchment paper or a loose lid.

Put the pan in a 400 degree oven for about an hour. Stir the mixture at the halfway point. As the vegetables cook, the volume will reduce and they will release their liquid. Flavors of the vegetables will combine and compliment one another and the vegetable broth ties together the flavors of the stew.

There is room for variation in the cooking time. As the cooking time increases, more broth is released and the vegetables become softer. Some cooks prepare this dish entirely on the stove top.

My wife liked this dish very much. She said it fit into her comfort food category. I usually opt for steak over vegetables. I’m not much of a squash or eggplant fan, but this was a good combination. I added a grilled lamb shoulder chop to complete the dinner. With so much fresh produce available, I plan on repeating this several times this summer.

Four Bean Stew

It's four beans because that's what I happened to have on hand. My mixture consisted of red lentils, black-eyed peas, small white beans , and red beans. It could just have easily been 5 or 6 different kinds of beans. Back in 2007, I posted a recipe for ham and black eyed peas. I think I've added to my cooking skills since then. So, here my 2010 recipe for ham and beans stew. I'm calling it a stew because it is thicker than a soup. We cooked a a shank end ham for the holidays. The nice thing about a ham is that so many meals can be made, there is lots of ham for sandwiches, and the bone anchors a great soup or stew.


Recipe #34 Ham and mixed bean stew

Ham bone
1 pound cooked ham
2 cups mixed dried beans (about one pound)
1 chopped onion
1 chopped celery stick
1 chopped carrot
2 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons molasses
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon cooking oil

(1)Soak the beans first. This hot-soak method is from the Central Bean company page.

After sorting and rinsing the beans, in a large pot add 10 cups of water for each pound (2 cups) of dry beans. Bring to a boil. Boil for 2 or 3 minutes, remove from heat, cover and stand at least 1 hour (quick-soak method), but preferably 4 hours or more; maximum 24 hours. (The longer soaking time is recommended to allow a greater amount of sugar to dissolve, thus helping the beans to be more easily digested.) Whether you soak the beans for one hour or several, discard soak water; rinse beans and pan. Return beans to pan, add fresh cold water to fully cover the beans.

The sugar they are refering to, is the undigestable sugars that can cause gas. This method reduces those sugars and softens the beans. Long cooking also reduces the problem.

(2) When the beans have soaked and are ready to cook add a small amount of oil to your cooking pot. Cook the chopped vegtables. Add the chunks of ham and the bone. If you have a few peieces of the rind with attached fat, throw those in the pot too. A little fat will add a lot of flavor.

(3) Add the rinsed and soaked beans. Add only enough water to cover the beans. Add the molasses and sugar. These will help maintain the structure of the beans as they cook. Simmer gently for 3 or more hours. Cooking times vary, some recipes give times of one or 1 ½ hours, but the high altitude of Colorado generally requires more time.

(4) When the beans are cooked to your liking, remove the bone and larger pieces of meat. Cut meat into bite sized chunks. Before returning the meat to the pot use a stick blender to puree some of the beans. This will thicken your dish and give a nice texture to the soup/stew.

Green Chiles

Roasted green chiles are available now from the local farm stands. Yesterday afternoon the good folks at Mt Garfield roaste a half bushel of Anaheim peppers for us. The peppers steamed in the plastic bag on the way home and filled the car with the wonderful aroma of chiles.

The steaming makes peeling the skin a snap. The chiles should also be seeded. Roasted chiles freeze well and provide the opportunity for bowls of chile later in the winter. The half bushel resulted in slightly more than 6 pounds of seeded and peeled chiles.

I kept one package out of the freezer for dinner last night. There are thousands of recipes and variations for green chile. In fact, I think I seldom do it the exactly same way twice, but here is my basic recipe from August 2007 .

Recipe #9 Chile verde

4 -6 chicken thighs - bone in (or use a whole chicken)
4-8 seeded and peeled roasted Anaheim green chiles
5 or 6 fresh tomatoes - chopped (use canned in the winter)
2 cloves garlic
2 or 3 corn tortillas cut into strips
salt, black pepper, cumin, cilantro, orengano
additional/optional
potato chunks
tomitillas
cheese on top

Brown chicken and cook onions until soft. Add water or stock. Home made chicken stock is easy, but add a couple of cans of chicken broth if you are short of time. Roughly chop chilies and add them to the stew. Before serving, tear tortillas into small bits and add them to the stew. The tortillas will dissolve and thicken the broth. They also add a distinctive and authentic taste to the green chili. Serve with a cheese on top.


This recipe was cross posted at Living The Grand Life. An anonymous reader left this yummy recipe in the comment section.

Anonymous said...
Try this with your roasted chilies.
Remove seeds and skins. Flatten enough chilies to cover the bottom of a greased 9x13 inch pan.
Cover with a thick layer of sharp cheddar cheese, and a layer of Monterey Jack cheese.
Beat 4 eggs,with 1 TBS flour, 1 tsp salt and one can of evaporated milk.
Pour over the chilies and cheese.
Bake @375 for about 35 minutes until set.