The Twenty-Fifth Year

Happy Monday! I hope everyone had a fabulous weekend. Sorry for the lack of posting. I worked for 12 hours Saturday and spent most of yesterday recovering (read: napping). I did, however catch all the good parts of my hometown team do what they do best.

It’s no Yuengling, but for Steelers games, it will do.

Anyhow, after my marathon nap, I decided it was grocery store time. I was in the mood to cook. This is rare, so when the urge strikes me, I have to act quickly.

I decided to make a familar meal from growing up – oven beef stew. I can remember so many cold fall and winter days when my Mum (yes I call her Mum) would make this meal. Luckily for me, it was in the recipe book she made for my brother and me last year. (I think she got sick of me calling and asking for recipes all the time.)

Here it is:

Combine 1 T flour, 3/4 tsp salt, dash of pepper

Dredge 1 pound stew beef, 1″ size in flour mixture

Brown in 1T shortening

Add to dutch oven with 1 can condensed tomato soup, 1 soup can water, 3/4 chopped onion, 1/4 tsp basil, pared and cubed potatoes, 1″ carrot pieces (as many as needed for these two veggies)

Cover and bake at 375 for one hour, stirring two times. Stew thickens as it cooks.

Ingredients, minus a few – what can I say, I’m a scattered cook! Told ya I like fresh flowers..

So this recipe seems simple upon reading, and maybe I’m just a slow cook, but it took me an hour to prep! Although, it wasn’t all bad. It actually brought back a lot of memories of standing over the sink at my parent’s house, peeling vegetables, helping out Mum – aww.

Plus, I enjoyed a tradition started by my Dad – hot apple cider with a splash of peach Schnapps:

Love this mug he bought me too – it says “Some things in life are better rich: coffee, chocolate, men.” Haha my Dad rocks.

So then I dredged and browned:

Definitely messy! Then I combined everything and let it work its magic. While that was going on, I implemented one of my Mum’s kitchen rules: clean as you go. It makes the whole process much less exhausting when you don’t have to finish eating and return to a messy kitchen!

Them, I attempted to carve my pumpkin.  But I didn’t get too far when I discovered..

MOLD!!!! Ewwwwwwwwwwwwww!

Which is exactly what I said when I took the lid off and made that discovery. A word to the wise: don’t leave pumpkins in the house, they are like any other vegetable and need to be kept cold. Good thing it was garbage night. Ugh.

But joy of joy, by that time the stew was done!

Mmmm…just like Mum’s!