Happy St. Patrick's Day!

So, Cupcake and I have church tomorrow so we are having St. Patrick's Day dinner a day early. I told her the options, and she chose Beef and Guinness Stew and Colcannon. So we ran to the store this morning and got what we needed. And here it is:

Beef and Guinness Stew
1.5 lb beef chuck (I got a steak, as roasts are twice as big, and way more than two if us need), cut into 1 inch chunks
1 onion, chopped
1/2 pound baby carrots
Salt, pepper and dry thyme
1 bottle Guinness
2 teaspoons vegetable base (no extra liquid)
Dry instant potatoes

Layer beef, onions and carrots in 2.5qt crock pot, seasoning with salt and pepper after beef layer. Sprinkle thyme over the top, then pour the Guinness in. Then swirl the vegetable base paste into the Guinness. Cover, turn on high and cook 4-6 hours (or low for 8-10).

Turn cooker off, and sprinkle in enough potato flakes to thicken as you desire.


Colcannon
1 bunch kale, pulled off stems and torn into small pieces
1 stick butter (I used Kerrygold garlic and chive butter)
1.5 cups potato flakes
Water and milk

Melt butter in a pot and add kale. Cover and cook until tender.

In a large bowl, mix potato flakes and enough water to make very dry potatoes. Add kale and butter from pot. Stir, then add about 1/2 cup milk (more or less to taste). Then add enough water to make potatoes desired texture. Season with salt and pepper.

It is good and warm on this cold, drizzly St. Patrick's Eve. Enjoy!

Beef stew

I mentioned before that I had bought a small, 2.5qt crock pot that was better suited to cooking for my small family of 2. Well, today I bought a 6qt. Why? You ask? Well, my small group bible study has a soup supper during our gatherings every other week, which two families provide each time. My little pot was not big enough for my share. So, since I saw they were on sale, I bought one. I is the nice kind, made for traveling, with a lid that latches on.

Today, a friend and her son were coming over for an unspecified amount of time, so I thought, just in case, I would make something for us all to eat. That is what the impetus was to buy the pot today. So I bought the goodies to make beef stew.

My beef stew is an amalgamation of recipes I have read and tried over the years.

3 lb beef chuck roast, cut into chunks
1 small package baby carrots
1 bag frozen chopped onions
4-5 Yukon gold potatoes, cut into chunks
Salt, pepper and thyme to taste
1 carton beef stock (this is sold by Swanson, and is richer than beef broth)
1 cup red wine or dark beer (Guinness makes a nice St. Patrick's stew, with some quartered prunes added to counter the bitterness of the beer. Other beer I like is Newcastle Brown Ale)

Place veggies in bottom of crock and season with salt, pepper and thyme. Place meat chunks on top, and season again. Cover and cook until meat and potatoes are tender, 5 hours on high, or 8-10 hours on low.

When done, you can either leave the broth thin and soup-like, or you can thicken it. My preferred method of thickening stews with potatoes is using instant mashed potatoes. Sprinkle some in, stir, and repeat until desired thickness. Make sure you wait a bit between additions, as the flakes need to soak up juice.

Oktoberfest stew

This was dinner tonight. I know it isn't October anymore, but I just found it this week on pinterest. I am still figuring this bloggy thing out, so I don't know how to track back, but here's the link to the original site where the recipe is http://thecozyapron.com/oktoberfest-stew-and-shiny-happy-people/

The only changes I made were I only used a quarter of a small cabbage, and I used while caraway seeds, as I missed that part of the recipe, I doubt I could've found ground caraway at the local store anyway, and my grinder doesn't grind well :P

Also, because it is after thanksgiving, the only seasonal beer I could find were winter ales. So I found a local amber lager to use...Red Hook No Equal lager, made for Seattle Sounders fans. In general, I prefer ale, but it isn't bad, so I am able to finish the bottle after using some in the stew ;)

With the minor changes that I made, it is very yummy. I will probably put the full amount of cabbage next time, but wasn't sure how it would go over with M. But it got a thumbs up from her :) Can't ask for more than that!

First crock pot of the season

I bought a new crock pot. Not because there was anything wrong with the one I already had. It was just too big. For a family of two (me and my girl M), 5.5qts was more food than we needed, or didn't cook properly when not full enough. So when I saw a 2.5qt on sale, it was a go. It is a cute, seasonal one with owls on it :)

So today I cooked my beef and Guinness stew. Since we were home all day, and I didn't get my mojo moving early enough, I cooked it on high for about 3 hours. The recipe is my mental amalgamation of several different recipes I've gotten out of books and online. Here is what it was tonight:

1 3lb boneless beef chuck roast, cut into 1-2 in cubes
1/2 bottle Guinness (dispose of the other half as you see fit ;) )
Salt, pepper, dry thyme
Chopped onion, celery and carrot (I used half of a carton of pre-prepped mirepoix)
A big handful prunes, cut in half

Put everything in the pot, put on the lid, turn it on, and walk away. As I said, on high it was about 3 hours. Low maybe 6-8.

When it was done, I then added 1/2 to 3/4 cup instant potato flakes to thicken all the yummy stuff up. I was going to put in chopped red potatoes, but one was bad, and there wasn't room in my new little pot. Maybe I should get a smaller roast next time :)