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.

Caribou Coffee and Chicken Alfredo

One of mine and Dan's favorite things to do when the weather is nice is to walk over the bridge to Caribou and get coffee and talk. It was a bit chilly today, like in the 30's but we trekked over to Caribou for some nice hot mochas (his a Campfire Mocha mine a Turtle Mocha). It was really nice, cause it's been forever since we have been able to do that. Plus I didn't have the best day so it was nice to spend time with my hubsie and talk. We did this after he got out of work so after our coffee it was time for me to get home to make dinner. Tonight it was Chicken Alfredo.

First off let me give you a great way to make chicken where you don't have to constantly watch it and it's gets cooked through and it still juicy.

The best way to cook chicken:

1. Get a skillet nice and hot with olive oil.
2. Season up your chicken on one side and place that side down in the skillet. After it gets nice and brown on the side flip it and cooked one minute more.
   
3. Place the skillet in a 350 oven for 15 mins (depending on the size of your chicken it could take more or less time). If your skillet doesn't have an oven safe handle cover the handle with foil before placing in oven.
   
4. Remove from oven and let sit a few mintues to let the juices redistribute and then slice or serve whole. For the alfredo I sliced each breast and placed it on top of the pasta.

For this alfredo I used penne pasta, because that is what I had on hand, but you can use fettucini or whatever pasta you prefer. But alfredo sauce is thick so you want something that can hold that sauce well.

Alfredo Sauce

2 T butter
2 T flour
2 - 3 cloves garlic, grated
1.5 - 2 cups milk
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese
salt, pepper and parsley

Melt the butter in a saucepan and grate in your garlic. Once melted and fragrant with garlic, add the flour to make a roux. Once thick add your milk, stirring it in. Salt and pepper and let it come to a bubble, it will thicken. Add the parmesan cheese and the parsley, stir to combine. Check for seasoning, sometimes you can add more cheese or pepper. Add over your favorite pasta and you are good to go!

I will say I sometimes have issues with the sauce thickening up, either I have to wait it out or sometimes after I add the cheese it thickens a bit.

So for my finally dish, and since I want fun pictures for this blog I made my plates look fancy. I plated the pasta and sauce and added the sliced chicken on top, and it looked quite nice!

I know, I know, I still need to work on my pics...they are gonna be the death of me, but I will learn how to take nice food pics eventually...*sigh*

That's all for today!!

Eat, Drink and Be Merry!