Brunswick Stew

I have no idea how this wonderful creation avoided my radar for so long. I love southern food, and this stew is a perfect example of why I love it so much.

Brunswick Stew has been cooked in Virginia for at least 150 years, though it's quite likely versions of the recipe go back at least another 100 years. Brunswick County in Georgia also lays claim to the recipe, but historical evidence seems to support Virginia.

Originally cooked with squirrel, the thick stew is now made primarily with chicken- rabbit and pork often being added as well. Like most traditional dishes, everybody and their uncle has their own version, so feel free to experiment. You can use my recipe, or you can work via poem:

First catch your chicken, clean and cut them.
And in an iron pot you put them
And water nearly to the top
And in it salt and pepper drop
Boil slowly.  Your tomatoes peel;
Put in a shin or so of veal;
And for the flavor, bear in mind,
A chunk of middling with the rind.
Next some onions you throw in,
The young and tender skin,
And butter beans do not forget;
And what is more important yet;
The corn, but do not be too fast,
For you must cut and add it last;
For better than the flour you'll find it'll do
To give some thickness to the stew.
Some lemon peel cut very thin
May now be added and stirred in,
And err it's taken from the fire,
Give it a dash of Worcestershire,
And soon you'll hear it's praises ring,
This is a dish fit for a King.
           --Virginia S. Woodroof, 1930   Here's what I did:  Cook over medium heat for 10 minutes:1 1/2 Cups Onion, diced 1 Cup Carrots, diced1/2 Cup Celery, diced  Add:One Whole Chicken, cooked and shredded1 Pound Smoked Pork Shoulder, shredded1 1/2 Cups Crushed Tomato1 1/2 Cups Chicken Stock1/4 Cup Whiskey 1 Cup Potato, diced2 Teaspoons Dried Thyme2 Teaspoons Black Pepper1 Teaspoon Hot Sauce1 Teaspoon Chili Powder1 Teaspoon Mustard Powder2 Bay Leaves  Simmer 45 minutes.Add:1 Cup Frozen Sweet Corn1 Cup Frozen Lima Beans1 Tablespoon Worcestershire Sauce   Simmer 15 minutes.Serve.  *You have options with the chicken and pork. You could boil the chicken first, making a chicken soup that you use later for the dish. Or you can oven roast it. Or smoke it. Or you can buy a pre-cooked one. Same with the pork- I was able to find a wonderfully smoked pork shoulder. This saves a lot of time!    

Beef & Barley Soup

Poor barley has somehow gotten the short shrift in the grain world. This is sad, because barley is totally terrific- chewy, nutty, and wholesome. It's also really easy to prepare- you can simply boil one cup of barley in three cups of water for 25 minutes and you're good to go. Better yet, you can make my amazing beef & barley soup, and see first hand how tasty this little grain is.

Begin by browning:
2 Lbs. Chuck or Top Round, cut into 2 inch squares

Remove from pan.
Add:
4 Carrots, quartered
3 Ribs Celery, halved
1 Large Onion, diced into large chunks
1 Parsnip, halved
4 Whole Cloves Garlic

Cook veggies for 5 minutes, and then return beef to pot.
Add:
2 Cups Beef Stock
1 Cup Purred Tomatoes
1 Cup Stout Beer
2 Tablespoons Dried Italian Seasoning

Bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium-low.
Cook 1.5 hours.

Remove as much of the celery, parsnip, and garlic as you can.
Wash and then add:
3/4 Cup Barley

Cook for one more hour, stirring every 15 minutes.

*To shorten final cooking time, you can start the barley in a separate pot. Cook it for the first 30 minutes in this pot, drain, and cook the final 30 minutes in the soup pot.

*You don't have to remove the celery, parsnip, and garlic. I like to do so because I feel it helps the final texture of the soup.

Turkey Stew

It gets "cold" and rainy in Los Angeles just a few times per year. Today is one of those days. So I decided to try something new, and make a turkey stew. Had some fun playing with flavors, especially the apple notes. It turned out pretty terrific.

Cut into good-sized chunks, and then brown:
2 Pounds Turkey, white, dark, or mixed

Remove turkey from pot.
Immediately add:
3 Carrots, quartered
3 Ribs Celery, quartered
1 Onion, quartered
2 Green Apples, quartered (remove core!)
3 Cloves Garlic, smashed
Pinch Salt

Roast veggies for 4-5 minutes, and then remove from pot.

Add:
2 Tablespoons Butter or Chicken Fat
2 Tablespoons Flour
Cook fat & flour for 3 minutes. Whisk constantly.

Whisk in:
1.5 Cups Chicken Stock
1/2 Cup White Wine
1/2 Cup Apple Juice
1/2 Cup Water
1/4 Cup Apple Cider Vinegar
2 Tablespoons Dried Thyme
1 Tablespoon Dried Sage

Allow the liquid to come to boil.
Return turkey and vegetables to the pot.

Cover, and transfer to a 300 degree oven.
Cook 1.5 hours.

Easy Meat Sauce

This is an easy to make, stripped down meat sauce. Not a lot of hard work involved in this one!

28oz. Can Ground Tomato
1/3 Cup Olive Oil
4 Cloves Garlic
1 Tsp. Onion Powder
1 Tsp. Sugar
1 Tsp. Dried Oregano or Italian Seasoning
Salt

1Lb. Ground Beef
15% Fat, Grass-fed preferred
1 Tbsp. Salt
1 Tsp. Garlic Powder
1 Tsp. Onion Powder

Season ground beef. Brown for about 3 minutes in a large pan. Drain fat, add remaining ingredients. Simmer at least 30 minutes, preferably for one hour.

Brisket

Passover is not my favorite holiday. I'm positively incapable of going 8 days without any kind of leavened bread. In a strange gesture of dedication, I try to live through the entire holiday without eating any sweet sweet forbidden pork. Generally, I fail. (But, in my defence, it's usually by mistake. Like the one year I went to a friend's house for Easter and realized the extent of my failure only after I had eaten a ham sandwich. I ham sandwich that was made AFTER the Easter dinner.)

What I do like about Passover, though, is the feast tradition. So, last night I made a little bit of awesome. The highlight of the meal was this brisket.

1 Brisket
1 Cup Beef Stock
1 Cup Water
2 Onions, sliced
2 Tsp. Sherry Vinegar
1/8 Cup Crushed Tomatoes
Fresh Thyme & Sage

Season brisket with salt & pepper, then brown both sides. Remove from pan, deglaze with water & stock. Add remaining ingredients, return brisket to pan. Bring everything to a boil, cover, and then transfer to a 300 degree oven. Cook for three hours.

Allow brisket to cool for about 20 minutes, then slice against the grain of the meat. Strain cooking liquid, and serve as sauce.

Chili

With all the talk of fresh and seasonal these days, you might forget that it's winter.  Fresh and winter don't exactly go hand in hand.  Is it possible to be preserved and seasonal?

Chili is the perfect vessel for our experiment.  It’s a cowboy dish.  Close your eyes.  Picture a group of cowboys searching the fields for perfect leaves of sage and delicate edible flowers.  If you've ever seen a cowboy movie, I bet you a have pretty silly picture in your mind's eye right now.  The great cowboy cooks of yesterday traveled with bags of dried herbs & spices, so that's what we're going to do too.

If you feel like being purely preserved, you could use beef jerky as your protein, though I wouldn’t recommend it.  (If you do, use less salt!)  I would encourage using grass fed beef.  Not only does it taste better, but you’ll also be keeping the cowboy spirit.  Cowboys might not have spent hours searching for the most beautiful sprig of rosemary, but they didn’t feed their cows corn, either!

They say a great chili cook never reveals his secrets.  Well, not exactly, at least.  So all you get is a list.  Since I'm a nice guy, I'll give you a little help; ingredients are listed by the amount I used, & I didn't use more than two tablespoons of anything.

2 Lbs. Grass Fed Ground Beef

1 32oz. Can Ground Tomato

Salt

Chili Powder

Crushed Ancho Chili

Cocoa Chili Blend

Garlic Powder

Coriander

Onion Powder

Black Pepper

Italian Seasoning

Ground Sage

Bay Leaves

Worcestershire Sauce

Cinnamon

The Kitchen Sink

Brown beef & remove excess fat.  Add half your spice mix, and cook one minute.  Add tomato and remaining spice mix. Cook at least 45 minutes, up to 3 hours.  Stir occasionally. 

*It's best to slowly build the flavor of the chili. Start with less spice than you think you need, then add as necessary. 

Chicken Soup (Of the Jews)

I hadn't been planning on posting two recipes in a row, but I have a feeling the cold spell won't last.  Yup, it's actually cold enough in Los Angeles to make soup.  (Note: It is NOT cold enough to wear a parka.  If you are an Angeleno who breaks out the mittens and scarves when the temperature drops below 65, please email me.  We're going to take a little field trip.  To Canada.)

I thought this recipe was pretty timeless, but, this time around, I actually found a way to improve it.  Amazing.

1 Big Old Chicken

5 Carrots

5 Stalks Celery, including leaves

1 Onion

2 Parsnips

1 Turnip

Salt

Big old chicken?  Indeed.  The older the bird, the more flavor in the bones.  So look for a chicken labeled 'roaster'.  

Rinse the chicken.  Place it in a large stock pot, and cover with cold water.  Bring to a boil, and let the scum rise to the top.  Remove chicken, and rinse both the bird and the pot.  Return the chicken, add remaining ingredients.  Cover with more cold water.

Simmer for about 4 hours.  Simmer, my friends, not boil.  Strain broth.  Save the chicken and carrots, they're good eating.  Compost the rest.  

If you want a really clear broth, you can return the strained soup to the pan, and add two lightly beaten egg whites. Allow to boil for a few minutes, and the extra junk will be picked up by the congealing protein in the egg.  Strain this through a cheese cloth.  The result will be a nice clear broth.  For me, the work/flavor/beauty ratio favors work waaaay to much to make this worthwhile.  But, if this sort of thing matters to you, do it!

Now for something special: Right before serving, I chopped a small handful of celery leaves and added them to the soup.  Balls.  I enjoyed this much more than adding chopped dill, which is the traditional garnish.

Chicken in Peppered Tomato Sauce

1 Lb. Chicken Breast, sliced fairly thin

32 oz Can Crushed Tomatoes

1 Green Bell Pepper, sliced

1 Medium Yellow Onion, sliced

4 Cloves Garlic, smashed

1 Tsp. Chili Powder

or your favorite dried, ground hot pepper

1 Tsp. Sugar

1/4 Tsp. Fresh Grated Nutmeg

1/4 Cup Olive Oil

Flour

Begin by seasoning chicken with salt & pepper.  Then dust with a thin coat flour.  Very thin.  Just a tad.  Don't overdo it.  Brown on both sides.  Remove.

Drain oil from pan, add bell pepper, onion, garlic, nutmeg, & chili.  Stir for about a minute, then add tomato, sugar, & chicken.  Simmer over medium-high heat for about 20 minutes.  Remove from heat, stir in olive oil, and serve.  It's nice over angel hair pasta.

Curried Tomato Soup

28oz Can Crushed Tomatoes
1 1/2 Cups Vegetable Stock

3 Cloves Garlic, crushed
One Medium-Hot Pepper, chopped fine
     I Used a Fresno Pepper
1 Tbs. Curry Powder
1/8 Cup Olive Oil

1/2 Cup Milk or Cream
1/4 Cup Fresh Basil, chopped
1/8 Cup Cilantro (Optional), chopped

1 Grilled Cheese Sandwich

Heat olive oil over a medium hot flame.  Add garlic, pepper, and curry powder.  Heat one minute, stir frequently.  Add tomatoes and stock.  Heat 20 minutes.  Remove from heat, blend in milk.  Add basil and, if you'd like, cilantro. 

Yeah, it's that easy.

Serve, clearly, with a grilled cheese sandwich.

(Breakfast) Beef Stew

This is my take on a recipe first published in Marion Harland's Common Sense for the Household (1884), updated in The American Heritage Cookbook (1964, edited by Helen McCully).  I've updated it to suit my taste, and you should feel free to play with it, too.  This was, without a doubt, the best beef stew I've made.

2 Lbs. Beef, cubed

Grass fed beef preferred!

2 Tbs. Flour

1 Tbs. Fat, your choice, butter preferred

1 Small Onion, sliced

2 Carrots, quartered

3 Ribs Celery, quartered

1 Parsnip, quartered

1 Small Green Bell Pepper, quartered

3 Cloves Garlic, crushed

1 1/2 Cup Beef Broth

3/4 Cup Water

1 Tbs. Freshly Cracked Black Pepper

4 Sprigs Savory

6 Sprigs Marjoram

6 Sprigs Thyme

1 Tsp. Salt

1 Tbs. Mustard

1 Tbs. Worcestershire Sauce

Juice of 1/2 Lemon

2 Sprigs Savory

4 Sprigs Each Thyme & Marjoram

Salt

Begin by coating beef with flour.  Melt fat in pan, then add beef to brown.  After beef browns, add vegetables.  Cook 5 minutes.  

This step is optional, but recommended.  Not only does it deepen the flavor of the dish, the melting fat & flour form a roux that will thicken the stew.  If you decide not to brown, omit the flour.

Add remaining ingredients in the top part of the list.  You'll save yourself some time (thyme!) later by either tying the herbs together with twine, or putting them in a tea bag.  See, the herbs are woody, and not especially tasty to eat, so- better to keep them in one place and remove them when the dish is done.

Bring to a boil.  Lower heat to simmer.  Walk away for 1.5 - 3 hours.  You can stir from time to time, but that's all the work you need to do.

In the last five minutes, add the remaining ingredients.  Again, it's a good idea to keep the herbs together.  Taste, and add salt as necessary.  Serve over some kind of simple starch- rice, potato, noodles.

As with all dishes of this kind, it's only going to get better with a day or two in the fridge.  Also, don't be put off by the long list of ingredients.  There isn't a lot of work to do, I promise.  The assembly took 20 minutes, including the browning.

Why is it called a breakfast stew?  I have no idea!  Maybe this was breakfast in 1884.

Pepper Steak

Approx. Two Lbs. Beef

Bottom Round preferred

Two Jars Tomato Sauce

One Onion

Two Green Bell Peppers

4-5 Cloves Garlic

Begin by thinly slicing beef into strips.  If you slightly freeze before slicing, it will make your slicing easier!  Next,  brown the beef over medium heat.  This is optional, but will help render off a lot of fat.  Might as well be a little healthy, eh!  Remove beef from pot.

Add sauce, onions, garlic, pepper, and beef to pot.  Let bring to boil, reduce heat, let simmer for about 45 minutes.  I like to serve it over wide egg noodles.  

This is one of those dished that's even better the day after, makes a great alternative to a meatball sandwich.  Additionally, you can make a whole lot and freeze it.  Oh yeah!