...) I'm often disappointed with traditional beef stews, finding them too acidic or even tinny tasting, and not beefy enough to boot.
But there is one version that never fails, and that is Ree Drummond's Sunday Night Stew.
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| Her pictures are way more gorgeous, her sauce more deeply mahogany, probably because I use chicken stock where she uses beef. |
It also doesn't hurt that Ree serves the stew on top of mashed potatoes that have been whipped with a stick of butter and a carton of cream cheese.
I highly recommend that you allow your rule-following (at least when it comes to recipes) spouse to make the mashed potatoes so that he can use the full amount of fat and you don't have to see how much goes into it to make it so luscious and heavenly.
(And this is why we all willingly fork over our hard-earned paychecks to cafes and bakeries, so we don't have to see all the good bad stuff that goes into everything that tastes amazing.)
Bonus: Pro tip from my friend Kayla is to freeze spoonfuls of tomato paste (because you NEVER need a whole can and it ALWAYS goes to waste) on a sheet pan, par-freeze it, then transfer to a ziplock in the freezer so you always have little dollops of paste when needed. You're welcome.
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Another meal we tried this week was Winter Albondigas Soup:
- Reading 168 Hours by Laura Vanderkam. It's surprisingly provocative for me personally, enough so that I might need to do a book report (aka another post) on this. As a teaser, know that I have woken up at 5 a.m. (!) for the last two days and gone walking! (I took advantage of Daylights Savings Time to make this shift.)
- Enjoyed this post on 7 Steps to Internet Sanity
- Appreciated this follow-up article from Stephie to my question about cookbook club.
- Love this quote by Cyril Connolly: "Better to write for yourself and have no public than write for the public and have no self."
That stew recipe is a standby for us. The soup recipe looks good too! You know it's fall when all the soup recipes start coming out. I love it because the leftovers are so easy to freeze and use for work lunches. Random curiosity: what kinds of things do you cook for your kiddos? Do you find that they tend to eat what you eat. Any kid friendly favorite recipes you want to share. Calvin is less interest in purees these days and wants to eat whatever we have. If this doesn't warrant a post, you should email me if you have any tips/experiences to share. :)
ReplyDeleteMolly, this will not answer your inquiry at all: Emilyn nowadays protests if she sees that what she's eating is not the same as what we're eating. Theo has been known to readily devour anything topped with butter, which is to say he eats more and more what we eat.
Deletegreat question, molly! sorry it has taken me so long to respond. yeah, for both our kids we found that a mix of purees and baby-led weaning has worked best for us. (so much of parenting is that, huh? a mix of this, a mix of that.) i definitely don't find it practical to just put human food on their trays because they might not get enough, but i also don't like to sit there and just spoon feed them the whole time. also, when we were busy and giving E a bunch of baby food, my ped could tell because emilyn was turning orange from all the sweet potato and carrot. so embarrassing. aaaaanyway. all that to say. it is hard to give them vegetables that are soft enough but that aren't just the orange veggies. but i do find my kids both like broccoli and cauliflower. the short answer to your question is: it's totally an adventure. one big win is when david makes a big pot of soup like cabbage patch or chicken noodle because it's got everything (carbs protein and veg) and everything is super soft. i use a slotted spoon to get out the "stuff" for the kids, let it cool down, and throw it on their tray. i may put leftover rice into the hot broth and then spoon feed it to them. welp, hope that gives you at least a start on this.
DeleteI only rule-follow when it comes to butter,
ReplyDeleteor cream, or any other fact as a matter of fat,
and by that, I mean leaving no margarine for error,
and anything good with butter is made better.