Wednesday, May 14, 2008

Nom Nom Stew

Nom Nom Stew
From: SmartAleq

Chunks of beef or lamb
Flour, seasoned with salt and pepper
Olive or vegetable oil
Lots of sliced thin onions -- 4 cups or so
4-5 cloves of garlic
Small can of tomato sauce
cheap red wine
Fresh oregano
Bay leaf
Orange peel
Baby carrots
N.O.T. -- yukon gold, red or russet, in small chunks
Assload of thick sliced crimini mushrooms

Dredge meat in flour and brown in oil--don't crowd the pan or overheat, remove meat to plate. On medium high, saute the onions, scraping every last bit of flour from the pan and stirring often. Get the onions next thing to caramelized, add the garlic, chopped roughly. Add the tomato sauce and stir well, then add a whole bunch of cheap red wine, enough to cover the meat when you add that back in, which you do at this time. Add oregano, bay leaf and orange peel (fresh is best but dried will do in a pinch. Don't be shy, get a couple good tablespoons in there.) Get the entire mixture up to boiling, then cover tightly with aluminum foil, then the lid of the pot and bake in a 350-400o oven for 2 hours or so. Stir once or twice, watch out for steam burns when you take the foil off.

When the stew has thickened up nicely, add the mushrooms, N.O.T. and carrots, cover again and bake for another 45 mins-1 hour. Season to taste with kosher salt and pepper. If you wanna be really slutty, serve in bread bowls but definitely accompany with fresh sourdough bread in one form or another because otherwise you'll be licking the bowls and that's just tacky.


Alternately, since you specify onions and beef, try doing something similar to the above but omit the tomato sauce, use dark beer instead of wine, add a bunch of thin sliced red bell pepper along with the onions and simmer over the stove for 45 minutes instead of baking, then serve over rice. Carrots and mushrooms are optional on this one, dump the taters and the orange peel. Also nom nom.

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