Harvest Pork Stew

Fall is official here and I have been craving the flavors and feelings of autumn! To welcome in October I pulled together a yummy, hot and hearty bowl of a harvest pork stew filled with sweet potato, carrots and apples!

Harvest Pork Stew
(inspired by this recipe.)

1 pound boneless pork tenderloin, cut into cubes
2 cloves garlic, grated or minced
1 medium onion, chopped
4 cups chicken broth/stock
salt and pepper
1 large sweet potato, peeled and cubed
1 large Jonagold apple (that's just what I picked up), peeled and cubed
2 medium or small potatoes, peeled and cubed
10-12 baby carrots, cut in half lengthwise

In a large pot, heat a good drizzle of olive oil over medium-high heat and add the cubed pork. Brown the pork on all sides and add the onion, carrot and garlic and cook until pork is no longer pink and onion is soft and translucent. Add the chicken broth and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and let simmer, covered, for 20 minutes.

Add in the sweet potato, potato and apple. Bring back to a simmer and cook, uncovered until potatoes and apple are cooked and fork tender, about 15-20 minutes. Add a slurry of flour and water to the broth and let thicken. Serve with a big chunk of hearty bread for sopping up the juices.

Total Autumn Harvest Goodness

This stew was pretty fantastic. I felt it could have used something more...maybe some apple cider to pick of the brown bits from the bottom of the pot after browning, just a splash. I just wanted a little more "oomf" to the overall flavor of the broth, but the veggies and the pork were great! The apple was a surprise, cause it soaked up all the juices and then at the end you got the apple flavor. A nice added sweetness and soft texture. I think the sweet potato was key. It added great color and flavor. I would have liked to use a butternut squash but I thought I would try the sweet potato first, we'll do squash next time.

Another must have....bread! And of course I gotta give props to Blackbird Baking Co. The have the most amazing, hearty, earthy, perfect for dunking bread...the Country Brown Levain. Its like a wheat sourdough...its amazing. They have a Country Blonde Levain as well, which has a nice sourdough flavor but I think I like the brown better. Seems heartier and more earthy. And the last hour of their work day is Happy Hour where everything is half off!! You can't go wrong! Delicious, fresh bread and pastry for 1/2 off! It's a dream.


Eat, Drink and Be Merry....ITS FALL!!!!

-BellaRosa

Barbequed Chili & Mario Kart

So I have been on a search for a chili recipe. I know my mom's chili, it's good. I love Steak 'n Shakes chili, I could probably not duplicate it. I wanted to find a chili recipe to be mine, or something I would enjoy making and that everyone would love. So I found this recipe from Rachael Ray that she made on her talk show (I didn't see the episode, I saw the recipe posted on Twitter).

It was for a Barbequed Chili. This damn thing has that tang of bbq sauce and the meatiness of chili. It's amazing! I love it!! It doesn't have the normal spice or cumin in it, which I actually kinda like, cause I feel like I can't always handle all the cumin, it's a strong tasting spice for me. I changed up the recipe a bit to go with what I had on hand and what tastes I liked. I also added beans, cause there were no beans in the recipe! I was like...you need more than just meat in here! So here is my recipe for the Barbequed Chili.


Barbequed Chili

1/2 pound ground turkey
1/2 pound ground beef
1 small onion, chopped
3 cloves garlic, grated or minced
1 T Chili powder
1/2 T paprika
1/2 cup of beer (other 1/2 for your husband)
1 cup chicken stock, or beef whatever you have on hand
2 T cider vinegar
2 T brown sugar
One 8 ounce can (1 cup) tomato sauce
1/2 can of kidney beans or whole can if you want more beans

• Heat a large dutch oven, or saucepan over medium-high heat with olive oil.
• Add the ground turkey and beef and brown. Add onion and garlic and season with black pepper. Cook a few minutes until onion is soft and translucent.
  
• Add the chili powder and paprika and stir in beer. Let simmer and reduce. Then add stock.
  
• Combine brown sugar, tomato sauce and vinegar, then stir into the chili. Bring to a bubble, reduce heat and simmer. (I don't have an exact time on this, I would say maybe an hour, but you just want it to get thicker and not so liquidy.)
  
• Add the beans toward the end to heat through. Or add them when you add the tomato sauce, brown sugar and vinegar mixture if you want them softer. I couldn't remember when to add beans to chili.

Now, growing up my mom's chili was always served over elbow macaroni. May seem strange to some people, but it's how I grew up. It's so good! So I made elbows with mine, but you can certainly eat it straight up in a bowl with crackers.

If you want the original recipe click here.
*Note: My recipe makes half the amount of the original. I have made the full batch before and there was just far too much leftover...but it is really, really good the next few days...yum!

Last night was also fun because my best girlie Kay came over! She had never had this chili before, nor had she eaten chili with elbow macaroni before, so it was all new for her, but she said it was really good! So that made me happy! And Kay is my fellow video game girl, so we had to play some Mario Kart Wii while she was over! I love playing with her, she is so much fun! She is the best!!



That's all for my dinner from last night folks!

Eat, Drink and Be Merry!
...and kick butt in Mario Kart!

Beef Stew for the Winter Weather Blues

It was snowing pretty hard this morning and has now faded a bit but there is more snow-a-coming! So what's better than a nice hot bowl of stew for a cold wintery, snowy night. And of course I have to make my mom's beef stew, cause it's the only one I have ever really had and it's so delicious!

Beef Stew

1 lb. stew meat, beef cubes
1-2 cloves garlic, grated or minced
1 medium onion, chopped
1-2 carrots chopped
One 32 ounce (4 cups) beef broth
1 cup water
2 potatoes, diced
Salt and Pepper
Slurry (2 T each flour and water combined)

• Brown the meat in the bottom of the pot, until nice and brown. Season with salt and pepper.
• Add the chopped onion and carrot and saute until softened.
• Add the beef broth and water and bring to a boil. Once boiling, turn heat down and simmer for 1 hour.
• Peel and dice potatoes and add into the pot. Simmer until the potatoes are fork tender
• Make slurry of flour and water. Add to the boiling stew, stir while adding the slurry. Mixture should quickly come up to a thick consistency. Cool slightly before serving

Of course you have to have bread for dipping in the yummy gravy of the stew. And lucky for us right across the street is this great little bakery, Blackbird Baking Co. We love getting their French Epi loaves, which is pretty much a "pull-off-your-own-dinner-roll" loaf. It sort of look like a branch off a tree. But tonight I decided on just a regular French Baguette.

It's got a great crusty outside and soft doughy inside, so good! And whenever I go I can't just leave with bread and not get one of their delicious cookies! They do have the best Peanut Butter Cookies I have ever had...all soft in the middle...yum! The hubs likes those and the Chocolate Chip Cookies, which I picked up for him. For myself I got the Cranberry Oat Cookie. It's amazing. So soft in the middle with a slight crisp along the edge. Not too sugary and just delicious! It nice to be able to support a local business and they have the baked goods that deserve the support.

*Note: I did not add pictures of my bowls of stew, which I am really sad about. But I forgot to buy beef broth when I went shopping and had to use chicken and so it's didn't look right and the consistency was off because I just realized I didnt make the slurry right, I only did 1 T each...like a dummy. So when I make this again I will have to post pictures.