Monday, November 16, 2009

Sunday Night Dinners: Beef Stew

Good morning & Happy Monday! I hope you all had a great weekend! I am nursing a bit of a cold so was in the mood for some comfort food. So what did I make? Beef stew! Soups & stews are a total comfort food - and so far the recipes have all been gluten free without making any modifications!

My aunt Barb made the recipe last week and blogged about it so I just had to give it a try. Click here for the recipe - here is the recipe in photos!

I took the recommendation of the author of the recipe and bought 3 lbs of boneless beef chuck and cut it up myself. This is a major accomplishment for me because I am extremely squeamish when it comes to touching raw meat, for some reason. But like the recipe said, if you cut it up yourself, you know what you're getting!

So after cutting it up, I browned it in some olive oil in my trust dutch oven (which is becoming my new favorite thing in my kitchen!). You have to brown the meat in two batches so as not to over-crowd the meat (which once again reminded me of the scene in Julie & Julia where Julie Powell exclaims - 'don't crowd the mushrooms'! Can't wait for that movie to come out on DVD).


You then set the meat aside and brown the onions. I made one modification to the recipe and added celery because I love celery in soups & stews!


After browning the onions until they are nice and soft, you add the flour (I used a GF mix and it worked well!)


That cooks for a couple of minutes and then you add the beef broth, garlic, thyme, bay leaves, and the stew meat.


After it comes to a boil, you cover the dutch oven with foil, cover it, and put it in the oven.


It then bakes for an hour at 325 degrees and you then add the carrots & potatoes.


Let it cook for another hour and - voila! Dinner is ready!


Similar to last week's recipe, this yields A LOT. So I now have my meals planned out for the week!


I can't wait to heat this up for supper tonight. It will be a great improvement over the boring baked potatoes I was kind of living on lately. Baked potatoes are great, but I'm not really doing the food pyramid justice by eating them every night. Which is why I've been making more dishes with meat lately.

I love recipes that make great leftovers - do you have any 'go to recipes' that are great as leftovers that you would recommend?

12 comments:

Mandy said...

Dutch ovens are wonderful things arent they? My favorite go-to recipe is stuffed pepper soup. Its the taste of a stuffed pepper without all the work of actually making stuffed peppers. I usually make it with sage sausage and its completely full of flavor. I could live on it all winter.

Chili is another favorite in my house. Beef stew too! We typically make ours in the crockpot (another appliance that is used on a pretty regular basis).

Lisa-Marie said...

The words 'I would like this in my belly now' spring to mind. I want to lick the screen, it looks so good!

I love stew!!!

qwerkyqook said...

yum! looks delicious. I love stews, so warm and filling without too much work. Slowly simmering for hours is a good thing. And a modification!!! you're getting wild :) well done Lisa.

Anais said...

Chili makes amazing leftovers! So does risotto (my fave is spinach and goat cheese :)

Kyla Roma said...

Looks so good! I have a crock pot that I adore, and I'm so excited to start making everything. My favourite part is prepping the veggies the night before and then just having to pop them in the next morning.

Lovely!

Abby said...

Looks delicious, Lisa! I made a stew SO similar to that last week except I used a Top Sirloin roast (? I had no idea what I was buying...but it was REALLY tender) and added tomatoes to it!

My go to recipe for left overs always seems to be a soup of some sort. Especially one that I make with black beans, chicken, chicken broths, stewed tomatoes, and chili peppers. It's delcious -- you can strain out the broth and make great wraps out of it!

Chelsea said...

Your duth oven is beautiful! I love stew. I make mine in the crock pot.

Lauren @ Sassy Molassy said...

Looks yummy! I just checked out an "Eating Well" Cookbook using in season items for great recipes. I'm really excited to look through it tonight.

The Many Thoughts of a Reader said...

Yum.. My husband made homemade chicken noodle soup yesterday and it was amazing. :) I like to make chilli for leftovers, homemade mac and cheese and baking a whole chicken in the oven.. (beer can chicken)

Amber said...

That looks so so so so good. SO good that I wish I would have read this before I went grocery shopping tonight and then I would have gotten beef and made it!! Those ingredients will definitely be on my shopping list for next week!

I really want a dutch oven, I might ask for one for Christmas!

Amber @ A Little Pink in the Cornfields said...

Mmm, this looks yummy!!! I love soups and chili's for leftovers, it's perfect!! :)

Marlys said...

Now this is the 2nd blog I've read with that recipe in pictures and I'm looking forward to making some soon! Does Mandy have the recipe for stuffed pepper soup? Sounds delish!