Spicy! Beef Stew

[jkath]

Hubby & I made this last night - Yummy!

Spicy Beef Stew

2 lbs. boneless beef sirloin, cut into 1½" cubes
7 Tbsp. flour
12 slices bacon, cut into 1" pieces, about ½ pound
1 vidalia onion (the big kind) in wedges
1 pound of baby carrots, each cut into thirds
5 cloves minced garlic
2 c. merlot
1 bottle A-1 Bold 'n Spicy steak sauce
1 can corn, drained
2 cans stewed diced tomatoes

Coat beef with flour, shake off excess; set aside
In a big soup pot, cook bacon till crisp, over medium heat.
Remove with slotted spoon.

In same pot, cook beef in bacon drippings, 1/3 at a time.
Return cooked beef and bacon to pot; stir in onion, carrots, garlic, wine & steak sauce.

Cover; simmer 20 minutes, stirring well each 10 minutes. Add corn & tomatoes. Simmer another 20 minutes, stirring well each 10 minutes.
Stew is done when carrots are tender.

Serve either over wide egg noodles, over rice, or just with buttered french rolls.

If you don't like Spicy food, go with regular A-1

 

[Lifter]

A different way to do it, jkath!

Here's another one, compiled somewhat thoughtlessly, in one aspect, or "with abandon" in the other!

Where sirloin cubes work very well, they remain expensive, and there's a huge lot of parts of a steer or cow that work at least as good, if you cook them right...

So lets get back to basic stewing beef, (ie neck cubes), or cubes of shank or flank, whatever, lets just keep it cheap...

And roll these about in flour and fry them up (so as to brown them) in some oil...

We could add a few tablespoons of chopped garlic to this, and probably an ounce or so of Worcestshire sauce...

Once we have this in hand, our stew pot would be on the burner, and add this plus the despised onion soup mix (I use Knorr!) and an appropriate amount of water to quantity...

I like adding "small" onions, by which I mean yellow or "Spanish" onion of about 2-2.5" diameter, skinned and chopped of their tops and bottoms, but an intact unit...

A few stalks of celery, washed, de-headed and the bases cut off (coincidentally, to my taste, the "bitterer the better"!), in about 2.5" lengths...

Carrots, washed, topped, peeled and, as appropriate halved, (we get the woodiest ones here!)...

Eyeballing it, as is my wont, some ketchup or BBQ sauce,,,stirring appropriately...and maybe a bit of tobasco...

It still looks very thin, as a gravy, doesn't it? But we re going to add yet more water! And about a cup or cup and a half of pearl barley, which soaks up moisture admireably and adds much to the mix, so do that now,....and keep stirring! Barley sticks to the pot too well!

Now I "cop out" and use the veloutine thickener to get my somewhat watery mix to an acceptable level...

A last minute add-on is frozen garden peas, as these need next to no cooking...

Addition of a merlot may add a ton of flavour, and thats a snazzy idea...

Canned tomato could take away some of the basic stewing strengths (this does take a few hours!) but have never tried to do it all in a hurry, so in fact you might just be onto something here!...

Corn doesn't, in my experience, belong in stew, (I have tried green beans, but the jury remains out!), and bacon adds so much to so many other things that I don't want to over-challenge it here...

Different countries, different weather, different recipes!

Not saying that you are wrong, just its out of synch at this time of year, here, and demonstrably, our "hearty" recipes are probably unthinkable in southern California...

But cooking gets fun, doesn't it?

Lifter

 

[Juliev]

sounds wonderful jkath!! I love spicy things.

 

[mudbug]

But cooking gets fun, doesn't it?

especially when you are describing it, Lifter! I am really enjoying your contributions.