I love comfort food, and it’s been especially appropriate these last two weeks. Two blizzards in one week made me decide that I had a distinct craving for stew. Not just any stew. Beef stew. Good beef stew. So I yielded to the craving, and this time I outdid myself. Better yet, my secrets will be revealed.

Forgive me ahead of time for vague measurements. It’s how I cook unless I’m following a recipe. I made this in a 5.5 qt Dutch oven on the stove. It took about an hour and a half from prep to serve. A note about the steak. I gave up last year on stew meat. Gross. Steak became the new meat of choice, usually a nice lean top round. This time, I used some top round and some New York strip steak. Next time, it will be New York strip steak all the way. Trust me, if you can afford it, it’s worth every penny. For the stock, I used Swanson’s Beef Stock for Cooking (33% less sodium).

Steak Stew

1 to 1.25 pounds of steak, preferably New York strip
1 red pepper, seeded and chopped
1 large sweet onion, chopped
3 carrots, peeled and sliced
3 large potatoes, chopped into chunks
1 bag frozen mixed vegetables (corn, peas, carrots, green beans)
beef stock to cover the ingredients in the pot (I needed around 40 oz)
5 tbs bouquet garni
ground pepper to taste
Several generous dashes of Worcestershire sauce
1/5 to 1/4 bottle of Lea and Perrins steak sauce
Cornstarch to thicken (needed a couple tablespoons)
Water to dissolve the cornstarch

1. Grill the steak (or brown it if grilling isn’t practical).
2. Combine all the ingredients in the pot and bring to a boil.
3. Simmer until the potatoes are tender.
4. Thicken with a mixture of cornstarch and water and then serve.

We are back from Farpoint, which was held this weekend in Timonium, Maryland just north of Baltimore.  It was a great time, and I’m going to put a more detailed review of the con, because it’s very small, but just excellent, but I had to take a moment to squee – just a bit over one thing that happened this weekend:

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It is just so ironic, that the week I manage to get the podcast out about my goals for the year, that I’ve completely fall off the wagon.  So to be honest – here’s how my goals stand:

Weigh less – I’m off my eating plan and haven’t weighed myself in a week.  I’ve also been eating like crap due to the storm.
Knit More – I’ve actually burned through some yarn.  I’m another ball in on my cardigan, and I finished up my hats for the Boom Effect.  And I started a pair of socks.
Stuff in the Basement – last week – instead of exercising like I had intended, I instead emptied five boxes, and filled three trash bags, and bag for donation.  And made sure that stuff was gone.
The Project – I have not been able to bring my self to cook this week.  Time is running out, since I’m going to be going to Farpoint this weekend, and will be in a hotel, instead of in my kitchen.  I’ve got three of the dishes planned out – so since tomorrow is supposed to be a snow day – maybe I can get at least three done.  As for the veggie dish – I may need to catch up with that in a later week.  I’m not sure what I’ll do. Read the rest of this entry

In this episode, Sara and I talk about our goals for 2010, and our submission for The Boom Effect.  And MA has technical issues and loses the best part of the podcast.

Better show notes in a future episode

Promos:

The Balicon Podcast
The Empress Sword

Comment here for feedback.  Or send us voicemail.  Again – better shownotes next episode.

Another week down!  I’m almost 10% of the way there.  Slow and steady is the way to go?  Anyway – today’s dish is a dessert dish called No-Pan Pear Pie.  And pound cake is one of the ingredients.  Now this seems like sacrilege – how can there be cake in pie?  Isn’t there an ancient feud between pie and cake?  Then how can they exist together in the same dish?  It’s a little shocking.  Now AB calls this not a true pie, but a fruit gallette.  So maybe it’s okay for cake to be in a gallette.  But – this is not the whole way that this dish is deceptive.  There are not only pears in the pie.  There are blueberries!  So – the question I ask the great Alton Brown – why not call it No-Pan Pear/Blueberry Pie?  Maybe it was the whole alliteration thing.

20 Recipes down, 188 to go.

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It occurs to me, as I contemplate my dinner options for tonight, that I really play fast and loose with recipes. Tonight was going to be macaroni and cheese and ham. This recipe has morphed considerably from the time it came into ours family. Twenty-eight years ago, when my mom was a newly minted cardiac nurse, she got the mother-of-all macaroni and cheese recipes from a patient. The secret to this recipe is that the sauce is based on a roux.

When I grew up and started cooking on my own, I started tweaking the recipe. I used the microwave to make the roux because I was hopeless at making it on the stove. Then I upsized the recipe to make a larger casserole. My mother had been adding ham for years, but I raised the stakes by adding broccoli. Unfortunately, my husband is not fond of this variation. (I will include the original and modified recipes at the bottom of the post.) Read the rest of this entry