Tag Archives: marinara

Melt in Your Mouth Beef Stew

31 Aug

Practically every recipe for beef stew calls for “stew beef.” I’ve seen it in the store. I’ve used it without much success in stew. But really, what the heck is it? After a bit of research, I found it’s typically chuck or round. Chuck is around the shoulder and round is around the rear of the cow. These cuts require lots of time in order to break down and become tender–and I have no problem with that. My issue comes from the fact that I’ve never had a beef stew where these meats actually tasted fall-apart tender and yummy. So what’s the solution? SHORT RIBS! Cheap and just as easy to use in stew as the above ‘unmentionables’. I am not a crock pot fan, so I used a heavy bottomed, enameled cast iron pot. Use whichever you find easier–but if you do use a crock pot, you will have to saute the meat and veggies in a separate pan and then add them to the crock pot.

Melt in Your Mouth Beef Stew

Ingredients

  • 3 lbs. short ribs (boneless will work if that’s all you can find, but bones add nutrition & awesome flavor!)
  • 3 T butter
  • 3 stalks celery, diced
  • 1/2 yellow onion, diced
  • 2 carrots, diced
  • 4 cloves garlic, chopped
  • 4 oz. mushrooms, roughly chopped
  • handful of sage, rosemary and thyme, chopped
  • 1 qt. chicken stock
  • 2 cups roasted marinara sauce (I keep some in the freezer at all times) or tomato sauce
  • 1/4 c apple cider vinegar
  • s&p

Method

Get your oven to 250ºF. In a heavy bottomed, oven safe pot, melt the butter on high heat. Sear your short ribs until you see a nice brown crust on them. Remove and put them on a plate to hang out. Add the celery, onion, carrots, garlic and mushrooms. Saute until they’ve softened. Add the tomato sauce, chicken stock, vinegar and herbs. Place the short ribs back into the pot. Press a sheet of parchment paper onto the surface of the stew and place into the oven. Cook for about 4 hours or until the short ribs pull apart easily with a fork.

Once the short ribs are tender, remove the pot from the oven CAREFULLY. Remove the short ribs and bones. Once the meat has cooled, use your fingers to pull apart the meat–believe me, it’s much, much easier than using a fork. Add the meat back to the pot and serve.

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Italian Baked Eggs

17 Jan

This dish is a take on classic shirred eggs. In my eyes, this could be eaten for breakfast, lunch or dinner. It’s easy to assemble and easy to clean up. I’m writing this recipe for 5 individual portions, but it’s easy to modify for the number of mouths you’re feeding.

Ingredients

  • 2 c roasted marinara or your favorite sauce
  • 5 eggs
  • 5 slices of melting cheese (I used raw milk Colby)

Method

Preheat the oven to 350°F. Place 5 greased ramekins* on a baking sheet. Fill each ramekin with about 1/2 a cup of sauce. Crack 1 egg into each ramekin and top with a slice of cheese. We use raw cheese, you could also leave it out. Place the baking sheet in the oven and bake for about 25 minutes.

Traditional shirred eggs leaves the yolk runny. I like runny yolks a lot–but if you cook the yolk all the way through, it turns crumbly and tastes a lot like ricotta filling in lasagna.

BE CAREFUL when you take the baking sheet out. Don’t grab the ramekins with your bare hand–yes, I have done this before. Use an oven mitt to place ramekins on a dinner plate, that way you don’t have to hold the ramekin or wait for it to cool in order to eat.

*If you don’t have ramekins in your pantry, you could use a muffin tin–just reduce the cooking time. Ramekins can be found on the cheap at places like TJ Maxx, Marshalls and Target.

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Roasted Marinara

17 Jan

Everyone buys tomatoes with the hopes that their texture is luscious and their flesh is fruity. Well, I recently bought some really, really crappy tomatoes (what was I expecting in January?). I sliced them open and they were pink and grainy looking. They were worthless. Or maybe not…

Roasted Marinara

Ingredients

  • 8 Roma tomatoes, 1/4′d
  • 1/2 onion, sliced
  • 4 whole cloves garlic
  • 1 celery stalk, chopped
  • handful of thyme, rosemary & sage
  • 3 glugs + 3 glugs olive oil
  • 1 t black pepper

Method

Preheat the oven to 200°F. Take an oven proof dish or pan and add 3 glugs of olive oil and the rest of the ingredients.  Place the dish/pan into the oven and roast for 5 hours, any longer and you should keep your eye on it. Take the pan out when the colors are caramel-y and the veggies are good and wilted, but not burned.

In a blender, or food processor, add the roasted veggies & about 3 more glugs of olive oil. I had about 8 oz. of unsalted tomato sauce open in the fridge, so I added that as well. Blend it all up until it’s reached a nice, smooth consistency. Serve immediately, store in the fridge for a few days or freeze it.


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