Freezer stew

I've been trying to clean out our freezer, and I had about a pound of beef chuck roast and a pound of boneless lamb leg.  Not enough to do anything with on their own, but they made a really good stew together!

Ingredients:

• 1 lb beef chuck roast, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 1 lb leg of lamb, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 2 carrots, chopped
• 1 parsnip, chopped
• 2 celery stalks, chopped
• 5-6 large white mushrooms, chopped
• 1 large onion, chopped
• Spices: dried basil, thyme, oregano; black pepper; seasoned salt
• 6 giant cloves of garlic, crushed in my garlic press
• 2-3 cups of chicken broth

I threw all this in the crockpot this morning and let it cook on low for 7 hours.  It came out really flavorful, the meat was perfectly tender and not dry at all!  Usually, I find my miscellaneous stews to be rather bland and uninspired with a taste that doesn't make me want to eat the leftovers, but this one was really good!  I think the secret ingredient was the Borsari seasoned salt.  We picked it up at Whole Foods a few weeks ago and so far it's made everything we've put it on amazing.

Short rib ragu

I made the short rib ragu yesterday while puttering around the house, and wow.  It came out delicious!  The meat is incredibly meltingly tender, and the sauce is thick and fatty without feeling greasy or heavy.

I made a few modifications out of necessity: my grocery store didn't have porcini mushrooms this time, so I substituted 0.75 oz of assorted dried mushrooms.  I also didn't have Worcestershire sauce, so I added a dash of tamari soy sauce and probably about a teaspoon of anchovy paste.  And I skipped the gremolata (out of laziness).

For the meat, I used about 5.5 lbs of bone-in short ribs.  I would have liked to put in more to increase the final amount of meat, but that's all that would fit in my pot!  Lacking an immersion blender I pureed the sauce in my food processor in two batches.  Finally, I ended up simmering it very gently for about 2 more hours to reduce it, in large part because that's just how long it was until we ate it.

The final product doesn't look like the picture of the recipe; mine is much more like a thick stew.  I can imagine it would be delicious served over some sort of floppy pasta (like bowties) so I'm trying to figure out a good paleo substitution.  Maybe thin blanched zucchini slices next time?  It's delicious in a bowl by itself though so I'm not thinking too hard about it!

Pork spare ribs in the crockpotribs

Ingredients;

• 2 racks of pork spare ribs
• a can of diced tomatoes
• 4 cloves of garlic
• 1 chopped onion
• ~3/4 tablespoon anchovy paste
• ~1.5 tablespoon soy sauce
• ~2 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
• ~1/2 tsp green chile paste
• 1 tblsp tomato paste
• salt and pepper

I put all this in the crockpot for 8 hours on low.  The flavors came out pretty good!  However, it really didn't need to be in there for 8 hours. Maybe 4 or 6 next time! 

Turned roasted chicken

This is my go-to roast chicken recipe.  The cooking method is from my Joy of Cooking, but the vegetables and herbs vary with what I have on hand.

Ingredients:

• 1 whole chicken
• Aromatic vegetables
• Herbs
• Butter
• Salt and pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees!
2. I prep the stuffing first, so I chop all my vegetables coarsely and toss them in a bowl with some of the herbs, salt, and pepper.  This time I used an onion, a carrot, and a stalk of celery, and three cloves of garlic that I smashed with the side of my knife.  For herbs I used dried basil, oregano, and thyme.
3. To prep the chicken, rinse it and pat it dry with paper towels (and take out the bag of organs, little plastic pop-up thermometer, etc).
4. Next, stuff the cavity of the chicken with the vegetable mix.  This time I tied the legs together with cotton twine to help hold it in better!
5. Liberally salt the chicken all over the outside.  Sprinkle it with pepper and your herbs too.  Finally, brush the chicken with 2-3 tablespoons of melted butter.
6. Set the chicken on its side (that is, with a leg up) in a v-shaped rack in a roasting pan or something that will catch drips.  This goes in the oven for 25 minutes for the first 4 pounds, plus 3 minutes per additional pound.  Then take the chicken out and turn it so the other leg is up, and put it back in for the same amount of time. Finally, turn it breast side up and finish cooking it--another 15-30 minutes, or until the thigh is 170-175 degrees.

Today I put a whole butternut squash in the oven with the chicken, just punctured in a few places to keep it from exploding.  It was good just mashed with a fork with a little olive oil, alongside the chicken!  Later we ended up roasting the extra vegetables that didn't fit along, with the vegetables from inside the chicken (doubtless contracting dire salmonella) and tossing them with some loose Italian sausage.  Also delicious!

Prosciutto wrapped pot roast

Prosciutto wrapped pot roast

Bored with pot roast - I was looking for a new twist.

Everyone said that the house smelled fantastic -- and a lot like corned beef.

Ingredients:

2.5 pound whole beef eye round roast

2 medium onions

1 celery stalk

garlic - chopped (as much as you like)

1/2 bell pepper - I used orange - very high in vitamin C

Olive oil

Veggies - as you like. I used a pound of carrots, a turnip and threw in a package of frozen carrots and broccoli for extra veggies.

8 cups of chicken stock - or beef, whatever you have

Red wine

Steak rub - Salt, pepper, garlic, paprika

8 oz prosciutto

Basil, thyme, bay leaf

Chop onions and saute in Dutch Oven with a couple tablespoons of olive oil.

Chop the bell pepper and add to pan.

Add salt and pepper

Rub the Beef with the steak rub all over -- a good coating.

Lay the prosciutto over the top and wrap it over the ends..... You could tie it - but it all falls apart if it is done right anyway.....

Now layer garlic onto the prosciutto

Lay the beef into the Dutch Oven

Add the broth

Add the bay leaf

Cook for 3-4 hours on low

Add 1/2 cup red wine, chopped turnip, carrots and broccoli and simmer for another hour.

Yum!

Slow cooker pork loin

I needed a crockpot dinner on Friday but all I could find without pulling the entire pig out of the freezer was a boneless pork loin.  Not ideal!  But I tried it anyway...

I rubbed it all over with salt and pepper, oregano, basil, and thyme.  Then I poked slits in it and inserted about 4 cloves of garlic cut up into chunks.  This went in the crockpot on a bed of onion slices and orange and white carrots.  I poured a mixture of chicken broth and balsamic vinegar over it, and cooked it on low for 6 hours (it was still a little frozen in the middle when it went in!).

This came out not too bad!  The flavors were good, and while it was dry it wasn't inedibly so.  It would probably be really good with a fattier cut of meat.

Easy Chicken Cordon Bleu

Ingredients: 

• Boneless, skinless chicken breasts
• Ham
• Swiss cheese
• Olive Oil
• 1/2 cup shredded pecorino romano cheese
• 1/2 cup shredded parmesan cheese
• 4 tbsp butter
• 2 cups of milk
• and of course - salt, pepper and garlic

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees
2. Spread Olive Oil in a baking pan ( I used a 7X10 for 4 servings )
3. Pound the breasts so they are relatively flat and about 1/4 inch thick.
4. Place 1 in the pan
5. Layer a slice of ham and a slice of Swiss cheese onto the chicken breast.
6. Place another breast on top.
7. Make as many of these little breast sandwiches as you want.....
8. For the sauce:  Melt the butter in a 2 quart saucepan.  Add the milk, cheeses and seasonings.
9. When heated throughly, pour over the chicken.
10. Bake for 40 minutes.

I roasted some eggplant alongside in the oven --with Olive Oil, garlic, salt and pepper.

(posted by Erin for Mom!)

Braised lamb shoulder

We got a deboned Icelandic lamb shoulder at Whole Foods, already neatly trussed up.  I decided to braise it with a bunch of vegetables following the instructions in "Art of Simple Food."

1. I took a small glass baking dish and covered the bottom with chunks of onion, celery, sweet potato, and orange and white carrots.
2. I rubbed the lamb shoulder all over with salt, pepper, oregano, and basil.  If I'd thought of it, I would have done this step last night!
3. I put the lamb on top of the vegetables with the fat side up, and added enough chicken broth to come about a third of the way up the lamb.
4. This cooked in a 375 degree oven for an hour, then I flipped the lamb over.  I cooked it another half hour, flipped it again, and cooked it one more half hour.  At this point, the lamb was tender when poked with a fork and the vegetables were mushy and delicious.

This made an awesome lamby vegetable stew that we floated slices of the shoulder on.

Slow roasted pork shoulder

A little while ago Lurene and I split a local pastured pig with a trainer at our gym.  It turns out a pig has a lot more meat than I expected, so two full freezers later we'll still eating pork at almost every meal!  Today's pork adventure is a roasted bone-in pork butt.  I based it on the recipe at Cook's Illustrated , but slightly modified.

1. Last night, I scored the fat cap of the roast into little one-inch squares, and rubbed it all over with kosher salt and sprinkled it with Chinese five-spice powder.  (I use this all the time on pork.  It tastes like it should be in cookies, but there's no actual sugar in it!)  Then I double-wrapped it in plastic wrap and let it sit in the fridge overnight.
2. This morning, I unwrapped the roast and brushed off any remaining salt.  I sprinkled it with pepper and put in on a V-rack in a roasting pan.  I added about four cups of water to the bottom of the roasting pan, and put it in the oven at 325 degrees with a thermometer set to go off at 185 degrees.
3. This takes about 5-6 hours to cook. (Mine was about 5.) Twice during the cooking process I pulled it out to baste it.  (Of course I don't have a convenient basting device, so I have to use a spoon.  I make Lurene do this if I feel like I might burn myself today.)
4. Wen the timer went off, I pulled it out of the oven, covered it loosely wit tinfoil, and let it rest.  I was supposed to let it rest an hour, but we only made it 30 minutes.

We had this with some steamed carrots.  I also made a quick pan sauce by deglazing the roasting pan with some chicken broth and apple cider, and added a little black pepper and garlic powder.

I think this was one of the best things I've ever made.  Probably a lot of credit goes to the pig, though.

Meatloaf

I watch the Food Network all time and get ideas. Then I alter them to work within the Paleo diet. Here's how I did it with Meatloaf. This works for Meatballs as well.

Ingredients:

2 lbs. ground beef (or you can use a mix of pork, veal, whatever you like)
2 eggs
2 tsps crushed garlic or 5 cloves chopped
1 package of frozen organic chopped spinach, defrosted and drained
1 medium onion chopped finely
Salt and Pepper, of course
Take off your rings and mix all together with your hands. ( Messy!)
Place in a loaf pan or casserole dish.

Add a 1/4 cup of organic beef broth or dry red wine.

For an Italian twist - I add Parmesan Cheese and Romano Cheese and bake it with tomato sauce at 375 degrees until the internal temp reaches 175.

For use in meatballs - just roll them into 1.5 inch balls. Brown them in a large frying pan. Add liquid of choice and cook for 45 minutes on simmer. Turning every 15 minutes.