Re: Thursday Night Chow? 2/13/2025

Jill McQuown wrote:

On 2/13/2025 6:42 PM, Carol wrote:

songbird wrote:
 

ItsJoanNotJoAnn wrote:
 

What's cooking tonight at your house?  Or are you heading
out for dinner so as not to get caught up in that Friday
night Valentine crowd?

 
  beef stew.
 
 
  songbird

 
Mine was a very good soup posted a little ago
<https://postimg.cc/5YknNdBB> but your mention of beef stew made me
think of this.
 
As I was clearing out last year's storm supplies (Not every day,
taking our time with it), I came across a can of Dinty Moore beef
stew.  It was one of those things that could be fixed up with some
adding spicing and in a real pinch, could be eaten barely warmed up
at need.
 

Dinty Moore brand canned beef stew was one of the things my parents
stocked up on as "hurricane supplies", but truth be told I think my
dad liked it.  Mom sure didn't feel like cooking actual beef stew
from scratch anymore.  No doubt the canned stuff could have benefited
from some extra seasonings.

Agreed and absolutely fresh is best, but as a canned storm supply if in
an area tormented by issues that cause power to drop, it was nice to
see one get a little better.

 

I think they have changed the recipe and for one of the rare times,
for the better.  It was barely beefy water before and still more
liquid in ratio but now it tries to be gravy with actual beef
flavor.  Humm!  It's still low on the culinary scale, ut with some
minimal additions reaches 'acceptable' now.  Needs added onions,
thickener to help the watery gravy, celery seed, black pepper and I
think I'd add some garlic powder (probably 1/2 tsp) then serve over
rice.  This is the 15 oz can.  I recall they have one twice the
size and don't know if it got better too.

 
I simply cannot imagine preferring canned beef stew to an actual
homemade beef stew.  But given the price of beef right now, I
wouldn't be making beef stew right now, either.

I'm with you on not preferring canned beef stew.  I don't make it from
scratch often but mine is stellar in comparison, at least partly as it
lets me use a wider blend of vegetables that we prefer.  Mini-example
I'm not fond of the mouthfeel of cooked celery.  The flavor is ok but
I'd rather use a bit of celery seed and any leaves the head has on it.
So, celery seed and then (if I have it), a few bits of Bok Choy whites
because they stay crunchy for the texture I like.  Bok Choy whites have
minimal flavor to them so it's just a nice texture note of maybe 1/2
cup to a 12 cup stew batch total.  Either way, not a horrible canned
storm supply that got a little better.

I'm not sure of other areas but Bok Choy in mature and baby types are
hitting mainstream markets here.  I saw it on a Kroger ad even.  Been
in HT for 6 months or so but varies in age/size.  At least it's there!
It's in the locally grown produce section.