come on you cooks

[incitatus]

ideas for gods own stew, please.

[Headtime]

I make a stew which everyone who eats it always loves,

It's (very) loosely based on the Scottish stew stovies, except that I use diced (rather than minced) beef, add a can of Guiness during cooking, and also add some pearl barley.

Try http://www.stovies.com for the recipe, but ignore the picture of the dish on the site, because theirs looks disgusting! Serve with warm crusty bread, and you're away!

[woofgang]

brown the meat and veg REALLY WELL(huge chunks of carrot, potato swede and onion, not nice little dice) before stewing, deglaze the pan with a lot of red wine then top up with stock or cubes and hot water.I add three secret ingredients before I put the dumplings in These are a teaspoon of worcester sauce, a table spoon of heinz (got to be) tomato ketchup and a tablespoon of redcurrant jelly. Use any meat you like or leave it out altogether for vegetarians. Make dumplings off the back of the atrixo packet and put on top of the stew balanced on lumps of meat or veg for the last 20 to 30 mins with a lid on again, as per the atrixo packet. Serve as is or with some freshly cooked veg...try equal parts of carrot and swede cooked together in a litle salted water with about two tablespoons of maple syrup then drained and mashed with butter. Even better is to make the stew the day before and let it cool over night then reheat thoroughly and add the raw dumplings to cook. Serve with more red wine or (oddly enough) champagne

[Rabelais]

I'm a big fan of beef stews, but there are a couple of things that you can do to make them really special. The best type of beef to use is skirt, which is a flank cut. It's best because a) It's a fibrous muscle b) It usually can only be found at the butchers or meat counter (Safeway stocks it locally to me) meaning that it isn't full of water so it frys rather than boils when you try and seal it. and most importantly c) my mother says so. Seal the beef in a hot pot with a little oil and add chopped onions halfway through the sealing (you can coat the beef in seasoned flour before but I think this should be saved for very special occasions). Deglaze the pot after sealing with a good quality stock and don't stint on it either, the potatoes will pull the salt out of it later. Boil for at least 2 hours and then add the chopped celery, the carrot and lastly the potatoes. Good quality spuds are essential too, King Edwards or Maris Pipers are recommended. Cook until potatoes begin to disintegrate at the edges. Fresh coriander roughly chopped at the last moment rounds the thing off nicely.

[cardinal]

I agree with all the above but only Rabelais mentioned the most important part of the whole thing, which is coat the meat in flour and then seal. Basically a stew is meat and veg in a gravy(sauce). Flour is cheap and not just for special occasions, if your'e going to do it, do it properly.

[Gef]

Stovies is not strictly a stew since the meat should be the leftovers from the Sunday joint. When making a stew I always: use a cast iron (Le Creuset ) dish with a tight fitting lid; coat the meat in seasoned flour; brown it in very hot oil in small quantities and remove it; brown the onions and (if used) veg (large slices or chunks) in the remaining fat/oil; put the meat back in with juices, add stout or whatever and bring to the boil scaping all the bits off the pot; season with black pepper and a dash of Worcestershire sauce; cook in a low oven (125C for a fan) for about 2.5 hours. I never use stock - the meat and veg add enough flavours.

[darth vader]

Campers Stew - not just for the great outdoors but a favourite when i was at uni. 1 tin corned beef, 1 tin baked beans, 1 packet/tin frankfurters chopped into small pieces, 1 large onion (chopped), 1 beef stock cube - this is the base stew. Now add some or all of; tin butter beans, tin chick peas, tin kidney beans, tin tomatoes, 2 large handfuls frozen peas, fresh carrot chopped up, mushrooms, tin of new potatoes or 1lb fresh spuds peeled. Bring the whole lot to the boil, add water/another tin of toms to thin out if necessary, plenty salt and pepper. Simmer for 20-30 minutes. Serve with slices of bread. Feeds about 20 students :-)