The beef over noodles thing

Picked up a pack of stew meat, marked down. A big pack. The Big Boy isn't THAT fond of any beef other than tenderloin, but this was on sale and hey, he's only one vote. THIS WAS SO GOOD. I used to have a recipe for something like this, lost it, then kept thinking I needed some special stuff to make this right. WRONG. They all took this to lunch the next day.

Beef Tips Over Pasta (aka Stew Meat & Noodles)
1 pound diced stew meat
28 ounce can crushed tomatoes
1 can beef or chicken broth
1 cup red wine
4 bay leaves
1 tablespoon chopped garlic

Heat some oil in a Dutch oven, add the garlic and lightly toast. Add the meat and saute until brown. Add the tomatoes, red wine, broth and bay leaves and bake in a 300 degree oven for three hours. Cook a package of egg noodles according to directions. Pour up the noodles to drain, put half a stick of butter in the pan and let it melt. Return the noodles to the pan and coat with the melted butter. (Scream at your kids here to LEAVE THE NOODLES ALONE. Kids LOVE buttered noodles.) Arrange the noodles on an oval platter and pour the meat down the middle. Bread. A salad. A bottle of red wine. Fruit or cheese for dessert. Life is good.

I am not a wine snob. I like good wine, I like rich wine, I like liquid wine. I do NOT do sweet, but that's just me. There are a couple of "two buck chuck" wines available here...not the real thing but Oak Hill and Five Oaks make $3 wine that cooks just fine. So there. Also, had there been a package of mushrooms in the refrigerator? They'd have been in here.

Bigos: The Dish of Polish Royalty

No, that title is not supposed to be a joke.

Poland was, for centuries, ruled by monarchs, thankyouverymuch (Hello? Boleslav the Bashful? Vladislav Spindleshanks? What do they teach in public schools these days?)

Ahem. Anyhoodle.

Bigos is a perfect food: Hearty, soul-warming, immensely tasty, easy to prepare and cheap if you have leftover pork in the fridge.

Personally, I use a fresh, lean pork roast because I like what cooking it in the kraut does for the texture of the meat.

Totally de-lish and 100% authentically Polish. This is my recipe, culled and cobbled from a dozen other recipes over the years.

Bigos Dziewczynka z Miasta (City Girl Bigos)
2 lbs Pork Loin, Pork Roast or other whole cut of pork
2 Bags Sauerkraut (Boarshead is good)
1 Kielbasa, sliced into 1" thick pieces
1 Large Onion, sliced
1 oz Dried Mushrooms
4 Cups Hot Water
4 Bay Leaves
1 tbsp Juniper Berries (about 12)
Kosher salt

Salt pork and let rest for 1/2 hour.
Preheat oven to 350.
Reconstitute mushrooms in water.
Line bottom of small roasting pan with kraut, top with half the sliced onion.
Lay roast on top of onions.
Arrange two bay leaves on top of roast, top with additional onions and remaining kraut.
Nestle sausage slices, remaining two bay leaves and juniper berries into kraut.
Pour mushroom broth - with 'shrooms - into roaster. Cover tightly.
Cook for one hour, turn pork, stir kielbasa and kraut.
Cook for another hour.

Serve with buttered rye bread or - better - potato pancakes.

Smacznego!

Note: If using pre-cooked pork, reduce the number of bay leaves to 2 and cook the whole thing in a Dutch oven on stovetop for one hour, or simmer all day.

Turkey Stuff

The other day I was noticing that there are some things I eat that...probably aren't mainstream. I'm not sure where the cut-off is between family and region...I know other people eat this way, too, but is it because we live in the same area or because we're related? Hard to call.

Campbells Tomato Soup and mayonnaise sandwiches. I eat until I'm sick. One slice bread, slathered with Kraft mayo and folded over. Lots of cold milk.

Cottage cheese with mayonnaise stirred in. (There's a fat thing going on here, I think.) And that's not lowfat cottage cheese.

My sister, my dad and my grandparents like/d glasses of buttermilk stirred with crumbled cornbread. I have been trying to like buttermilk for 50 years and it hasn't kicked in yet and...that doesn't make sense. But I don't like it.

But one of my five favorite things on the planet involves leftover Thanksgiving turkey. This just HORRIFIES The Big Boy, who doesn't eat food that touches, but you better believe ONE TIME A YEAR, we're gonna dig in.

Leftover Turkey Hash (a glorified name)

Chopped turkey
2 hardboiled eggs, chopped
Turkey broth
White roux
2 stalks celery
1 medium onion
Sage to taste
Salt and pepper to taste
Mashed potatoes

Saute celery and onion in butter until translucent. Meanwhile, in a small pan mix butter and flour and stir for 2-3 minutes...don't let it brown. Mix roux, vegetables, chopped turkey, eggs and 2 cups broth and stir until smooth. Let simmer to thicken. Add sage and salt & pepper to taste. Serve over mashed potatoes.

Ideally, you have leftover homemade yeast rolls, leftover cranberry sauce and leftover green bean casserole. You don't have to eat the green bean casserole (especially since you didn't eat it Thanksgiving), but it looks good on the plate;)

Chicken and Dressing...sort of

It's homecoming at church Sunday and since I don't GO to church (my mom takes my kids and I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT IT since I spent a large portion of my younger life in that church and it wasn't good) I'm sort of obligated to go to homecoming. Which means taking a LOT of food because...there's that thing about my kids. And how much they eat.

There used to be a tearoom in the town we lived in 20 years ago, and the house specialty was Poulet de Normandy. Now, I'm guessing if you had ASKED, they'd have told you Normandy was a big car manufactured by Ford, but the point is this worked. Really well with a cranberry salad and homemade yeast rolls. (And something else...but I'm blank.) So I think I'll make a grocery run tomorrow and bake up a dish of this. And then we can eat it all ourselves when we get to the dinner.

Poulet de Normandy

1 16 oz package stuffing mix...your preference, we use cornbread
1-1/2 cups chicken broth (or hot water with bouillon)
1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2-1/2 cups chopped cooked chicken
2 eggs
1-1/2 cups milk
1 can cream of mushroom soup
Grated cheddar cheese

Combine the stuffing mix, butter and broth and set aside. Mix the onions, celery and mayonnaise well, then add it to the stuffing mix and mix well. Spread half the stuffing in a lightly greased 13x9 baking dish. Sprinkle with the chopped chicken, then layer with the remaining stuffing mix. Beat the eggs in the milk and pour over the casserole; refrigerate overnight. The next day, take the casserole out of the refrigerator at least two hours before cooking. Spread the top with the mushroom soup. Bake in a 325 degree oven for 45 minutes; sprinkle with the cheese and bake an additional 10 minutes.

Seriously Good Burgers

In the early 90's, when I was working on that graduate degree I don't have, the health craze of the moment was low-fat. Turns out low fat doesn't work for me, but I didn't know that at the time and since I was spending five or six hours a day in the physical education department, controlling my diet was no problem. I cut lower and lower until I was eating less than 10 grams of fat a day. I was hungry ALL the time, and losing muscle for no reason.

Later on, I realized that my particular body likes low carb. Fat and protein are my friends. At some point in time I hope to convince my MOUTH that IT likes low carb because right now? I'll kill a man over a loaf of good bread. Or pasta.

But a few things stayed around because they worked, and one of them is the hamburgers we eat. Most people have no idea what's in them...just because they taste just like hamburgers, texture and all. But they are a lot better for you.

Mushroom Burgers
1-1/2 pounds hamburger meat (chuck, sirloin, ground round: your choice)
8 ounces fresh mushrooms
1 clove garlic
1/4 Worcestershire (or Dale's if you're from around here)

Chop the garlic into 8-10 pieces. Put the rinsed mushrooms and the garlic in a food processor and process until it's finely chopped...scraping down the sides as necessary. Add about 1/4 cup hamburger meat and process thoroughly. Add the mushroom mixture to the remaining hamburger in a large bowl and use your hands to mix in the Worcestershire. Shape into patties (you DO know to put an indention in the center of the patty so it won't puff up, don't you?) and sprinkle with smoked paprika or R.L. Schreiber's Mesquite Seasoning. Let stand for 10-15 minutes, then grill to taste.

Center Star Chicken Stew

Chicken Stew is a Center Star staple...all fundraisers, get-togethers and family reunions include a pot of chicken stew. GOOD chicken stew comes out of a black cast-iron kettle, over an open fire. That, however, also involves a lot of beer and an entire Saturday so sometimes, we fudge.

My mother grew up about 25 miles north of here, in another state, and she never heard of chicken stew. I moved to Fort Worth, in the middle of nowhere, and no one in my neighborhood had ever heard of chicken stew (although they all consider it a staple now.) I have NO concept of life without chicken stew...it fixes a lot of ills, it's really good and it's really simple. There is only one rule to follow and that is: Five Things. You only put five things in chicken stew. Get cute, add some other stuff and you have sinned and God will get you. Just mark my word.

The basic ingredients are chicken, potatoes, onions, tomatoes and corn. That's the five things. The proportions vary by family, and by occasion. If you're cooking for home? Half as many potatoes as chicken. Cooking for a crowd/fundraiser? Equal chicken and potatoes. No one will notice.

Center Star Chicken Stew

5 pounds chicken...whole, packaged, all-white, all-dark, your preference. Best is whole chickens, where you stew them, let them cool, debone and de-little black things and return the meat to the broth. This method also requires a Friday night before the Saturday. Next best/easiest is a bag of boneless, skinless breasts and a bag of boneless, skinless thighs.

2-3 pounds cubed potatoes

1-2 pounds diced onions

2 28-ounce cans diced or pureed tomatoes

1 small can tomato paste

1 28-ounce can corn

Chop the chicken, put it in a large stewpan and cover with water. Add a bay leaf or two and the onion. Bring to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer at least until done and an hour or so if you have the time. Peel and cube the potatoes and add to the chicken...no salt and nothing else. (For some reason at this point, if the other ingredients are in there the potatoes won't get done before Christmas.) When the potatoes are done add the tomatoes and stir well. Then add the corn and simmer for about 20 minutes to let everyone make friends. Salt and pepper to taste. (And if someone says, "This needs pepper," don't pour in an entire red and white can of pepper because if you do, the next day we'll have to pour out the entire kettle-full.)

Individuality...My sister-in-law likes tomato soup as part of the tomatoes. I like half whole kernel and half creamed corn. My sister doesn't like the smell of corn (I didn't make that up) so she uses shoe-peg, but that gets expensive for a crowd and besides...well, never mind.

When you first make this, it's all this stuff sitting in a pot. After it's cooked for a while everything melds...at a Chicken Stew (the event) there are no chunks of potatoes, they've all cooked down. And there are no chunks of chicken...just strands of meat throughout the pot. You eat this with slices of white bread or saltines. You season each bowl with Tabasco. You have a lot of cold beer.

And life is really good.

(Last year I paid...over $200...for this house-friendly black cast-iron pot. Number one, because I could make chicken stew at home and still have a semi-kettle, and number two because it came from a foundry that used to operate here.)