Bay What?

by | Oct 10, 2011 | Food, Life, Recipes | 3 comments

Made stew tonight. Forgot the bay leaf. FORGOT THE BAY LEAF!!!

Forgot the freakin’ bay leaf.

But it was GOOD. In fact, I never would’ve known…if I hadn’t already known, that there was no bay leaf in the stew.

So what is a bay leaf anyway?  What magical flavor does it impart if I couldn’t even tell it was missing?

And since you asked (you were going to, you know) here is my recipe for beef stew.

Susan’s Beef Stew

  1. Shoot a cow. Remove a pound or two of stew meat. Do something with the rest so as not to be wasteful. Apologize to it’s mother and feel remorseful. Tell yourself you’ll go vegan in a few days. Then don’t do it.
  2. Coat the meat in flour. Brown over low heat with some olive oil. Feel absolutely no remorse for squeezing those little olives until they burst. They can’t feel anything…or can they? Tell yourself you’ll never eat olives again. Now get back to cooking.
  3. Remove meat from pan, add more olive oil and brown (not brown brown, just cook) a couple of chopped onions. When onions are nice and perfect the way you like them…
  4. throw in most of a small can, the little bitty size can, of tomato paste.
  5. and some beef broth.
  6. and some red wine. wine is good. add some more.
  7. add a handful of thyme leaves. some salt and fresh ground pepper. garlic powder because you forgot to chop garlic with the onion. DO NOT ADD BAY LEAF OR YOU WILL GO TO HELL (just kidding…)
  8. mix it all up, bring to a low boil and toss in the meat.
  9. set oven to simmer, partially cover and walk away. tell someone else to stir every 15 minutes while you go do something else.
  10. come back in a couple of hours. congratulate helpers for not burning the stew or the house. add some red potatoes and baby carrots.
  11. go away again but make sure the helpers are still on board.
  12. give it a half hour, forty minutes for the potatoes and carrots to cook. add a bag of frozen string beans because really, do you have the time to deal with fresh vegetables tonight? didn’t think so…  this is a good place for more wine. have a glass and/or dump some in the stew.
  13. start warning people dinner is ready in 10 minutes.
  14. tell mr. spouse he doesn’t need to watch the rest of the show on the history channel, we know who won that war.
  15. dish up. serve with sourdough baguette and butter. because there aren’t enough fat and carbs in the stew.
  16. eat it again tomorrow night.
  17. by the third night, add some more wine and broth. throw in some barley. call it soup.

3 Comments

  1. Percikotts on October 10, 2011 at 10:58 AM

    Do I get a reward for being the first to leave a comment? How about a bay leaf, or enough bay leaves to make a crown, like the Greek Gods wore ( after all, I am a goddess, or so I have been told!) And it’s VERY important that you know that I REALLY am reading this stuff, even reading out loud to my very own Mr Spouse, and we are both laughing like we used to when you would write us those crazy letters in the 70’s, the ones that featured heaving bosoms and dark pirates or cowboys or whoever was ravishing whoever. Pirates ravishing cowboys, now there’s a thought, a topic for another blog! Love ya………….

    • Susan on October 10, 2011 at 12:05 PM

      Pirates and cowboys…way to go, Perci Kotts. And a rainbow flag instead of the jolly roger… this leads me to some bad–very very BAD politically incorrect puns. Unfortunately, during the time it took to write the disclaimer I FORGOT, totally FORGOT, what I was going to say.

  2. Percikotts on October 12, 2011 at 9:58 AM

    allrighty then! Don’t know what’s kosher to leave where, but I’m loving reading about the family in this way. Sure beats the old Highland Flinger!