This week at CEimBwe are cooking up a Lamb Stew found on page 189 of “The Food You Crave” by Ellie Krieger.
Showing the chickpeas, orange sections, carrots, parsnips and lamb
The recipe was a good choice by Farah of Confessions of A Novice Baker. Check out her site for full details. There are quite a few ingredients but don’t be scared off by that. It is an easy recipe, just a little timely for a weekday meal, at least in this house. Major cooking adjustments had to be made.
The Grocery List:
Everything was stocked in the Apple Crumbles pantry except the parsnips and lamb. There was a bit of skepticism when it came to the lamb:
- It’s very expensive around here.
- Were we going to find it available “cubed”?
- Ted is not a big fan of the meat. This is very odd. He is Lebanese for peat’s sake. Wasn’t lamb meat what he was brought up on?!!!
We approached the meat counter at the local Price Chopper. We didn’t even waste time looking in the meat case for cubed lamb and when asking the butcher he said “You’re going to have to buy the whole leg“. My thought “HOLY COW! I don’t want all THAT in my freezer!” I must have been thinking size wise of cows, buffalo or moose because when I asked, in a very weak, shaky, little voice …”well, how much will that weigh?...I only need a pound?”. Mr. Butcher Man said “oh about 4 lbs boneless“. Ok. Not as scary as I thought. Agreed. Turned to Ted and said “Hope I do this right for you or you’re gonna have a whole lotta lamb to choke down“.
By the way, the scary part turned out to be the price: $17.42 for 3.49 lbs. WOW!
Cooking the Meal:
As previously mentioned, the weekdays are not congenial for making recipes that require an hour and a half AFTER prep time to cook. So, we did this in three parts. Lamb stew scheduled for Wednesday evening.
- Tuesday evening: Prepare all vegetables. Dice, mince, cut, chop. Put into a bag in the fridge.
- Wednesday morning: Brown lamb on all sides. Saute onions. Hmmm… hair smells like onions and lamb. Better wash it AGAIN this morning. Put the lamb, onions, garlic, chopped veg., etc. in Crock Pot. HELLO!!!! We don’t have any red wine open. Thinking…… TRIPLE SEC*! It’s orange flavored. Let’s go for it…….Set the crock on low setting. Ted will turn on at 9 AM. *If the wine was added for the acidity to break down the meat proteins, then we missed that but the crock usually makes everything tender… so we continue with crossed fingers.
- Wednesday evening: Add chickpeas and continue cooking Ted’s meal 30 more minutes. Joanne’s Meatless Version: I used a 15 oz can Dark Kidney Beans. I used 2 fresh chopped tomatoes, and veggie stock. Cooking time was about 45 minutes.
Vegetarian Version of Lamb Stew with Orange
Our respective stews were served with Butternut Squash Patties (last nights post) and petite peas on the side for color.
We both really enjoyed the flavors in this dish. The cumin and orange were detectable in the vegetables yet not in the meat but they were not overbearing. Ted said the meat was so tender but didn’t take on the flavors of the aromatics.
- Lamb stew finished with mint, with peas and a butternut squash pattie on the side
Your pictures of this stew are incredibly tempting. Glad both versions were enjoyed. It’s been a long time since I’ve had lamb, and the price can definitely be a factor. Again, great job!
How smart to chop up the veggies the night beforehand. I’ll have to start doing that because I was in a tizzy about getting this ready in the morning before I had to leave. I had to laugh about the hair smelling like onions and lamb. I got to the library later that day and someone behind me had a salad with onions in it, but I didn’t know this, and I thought it was me. And I had a little freak out moment thinking that the stew had me smelling like stew, eek!
I’m glad that this worked for both of you!
Both versions look great and so filling. I made this a few weekends ago, because I knew there was no way I could pull this off on a weeknight.
This is lovely! And I love the idea of using triple sec. And what kind of person are you, who doesn’t have wine open???
Nicely done, especially the time management part.
FYI: There are much WORSE things to have in the freezer than a leg of lamb (or an entire lamb for that sake, we started buying one whole direct from the farmer last year and never regretted it).
Good job on getting this dish done in stages. It was pretty time consuming but definitely worth all the effort. I’m so glad you enjoyed it (both versions). Thanks for cooking along with me 🙂
Jessica: I had to re-wash my hair because there would be no one else to blame for being stinky this week. 🙂
Macduff: Pls. forgive. We do usually have white AND red available. Still, we can’t have our hands slapped for not being well stocked.
Nick: I remember opening a ladies freezer once and seeing a whole bird (feathers and all) laying there. No bag, no plate… just the bird on the freezer floor (she was a dog trainer). I think thats when I decided to go Vegetarian! GROSS… no animals in the freezer that look like ANIMALS!
Hey! I skipped out on CEiMB this week. . . no lamb stew for me. But yours looks really good. As for the give away, I just copied and pasted the rules from the one I won it from – Marthe. So I guess it is always three people and three gifts. But it can be something small. I’ll get the winners out probably this weekend. 🙂
Your stew looks wonderful. I sometimes prepare my dishes in stages to. Helps with the whole process.
What a great idea to get knock the prep out over a couple of days. I race around like a crazy woman in the mornings trying to get all the prep done for dinner. Advance planning would surely help the old stress level! Both versions look delicious. I also ended up going meatless.