Not Just Any Chicken and Rice

I keep posting Indian recipes, just because I love the flavors so very much. I do make other things in between, but often, if I have spent an inordinate amount of time researching a recipe, then setting about making it, getting all the "moving parts" moving as they should, executing the recipe, by the time I sit down to eat it, and gush over what great flavors . . .well, I just don't have it in me to do that all over again in a day or so. And, I just fall back on something regular that is tried and true.

I can't count the amount of times I have made one of my long-running best recipes, One-Skillet Hamburger Meal, just because it's easy and delicious. Or some pan-fried pork chops and Red Cabbage with Apples & Bacon. I have a lot of favorites.

So, if it appears that all I do is make Indian meals, that would be an incorrect assumption. 
 

Dinner of Chicken Korma, Barley Khichdi and Chutneys

I do, however, have a fascination for Indian flavors, and I do spend a lot of time researching them. India is a pretty big place. It is about a third of the size of the United States, yet has more people! Netflix has a show called "Raja, Rasoi Aur Anya Kahaniyaan" that while subtitled (a problem for some), is a fascinating journey through India and how and why the foods are distinct in some regions, how they came to be there, the influences of differing ruling systems, etc. India has a lot of different food regions. Similarly to the U.S. with southern cooking, northeastern cooking, midwest styles and so on. Here in the U.S., we have mainly been introduced to northern Indian styles of cuisines in the restaurants, at least in buffets I have sampled. This style is delicious, no doubt about it, but recently I have been delving into other areas and searching for what other styles of cooking exist there, and what other foods or food combinations exist. 

Yesterday however, I fell back on north Indian style foods, and made a Chicken Korma. Korma, whether made with lamb beef may be substituted) or chicken, is made with a "gravy" thickened with ground nuts, usually blanched, peeled almonds, but sometimes with cashews. I have a Lamb Korma recipe that is truly exceptional, and this chicken recipe is not too far different - only just a little bit. Whole, cut up chicken could be used, though the cooking time would need to be far longer. I chose skinless, boneless chicken breasts, but skinless, boneless chicken thighs would work as well. And, I used cashews for this dish. It tasted so wonderful that my husband and I just kept commenting over it. Here is my recipe:

Chicken Korma

Chicken Korma

Serves 4 to 6 

2 pounds skinless, boneless chicken, cut in cubes
¾ cup Greek yogurt
2 tablespoons water
1 tablespoon rosewater
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon white pepper
¼ to ½ teaspoon saffron threads, crushed
¼ teaspoon ground turmeric
----------
2 to 3 tablespoons oil or ghee, plus a bit more for cooking chicken
1 onion, chopped
3 to 4 cloves fresh garlic, minced
2 tablespoons fresh ginger, minced
1 - 3 green chilies, minced (remove seeds for less heat)
¾ cup raw cashews
¾ cup water or chicken stock
3 to 4 teaspoons Garam Masala 
¼ cup heavy cream, optional

At least 2 hours before beginning the meal, combine in a large bowl the yogurt, 2 tablespoons water, rosewater, salt, white pepper, saffron and turmeric. Stir to mix well, then add the cubed chicken and stir to coat all the chicken pieces. Cover and set in the refrigerator for 2 or more hours.

Heat a skillet and add in the ghee or oil of choice. Add the onions and saute them over medium low heat until lightly golden, then add in the garlic, ginger and green chilies. Continue to cook, stirring, until the onions are nicely golden but not browned. Pour the contents of the skillet into a blender container and add in the cashews, water or stock and Garam Masala. Blend the mixture to a fine puree. This sauce can be made ahead, even a day ahead, then refrigerated until needed.

Heat a large skillet and add in more oil or ghee and pour in the blender contents, then the chicken with all its marinade. Stir well and bring the mixture to just boiling. Lower heat to just a simmer, cover the pan and cook, slowly for about 25 minutes, or until the chicken has cooked through. If desired, add the heavy cream and stir in. Goes well with Chapatis, Parathas, Naan or rice.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

moong dal

My normal accompaniment to a dish with this much sauce is rice, whether brown rice or other. This time, I wondered what I could make different from just rice, and got thinking of barley. I hadn't come across barley in any Indian recipe I had seen, to date, yet when I looked it up, it appears barley (called "jau" or "jao") has been in or around India since prehistoric times, and was once a main staple. It has mostly been replaced with rice and millet, but is still around, most often as soup or cooked into a sort of khichdi or grain and lentil dish. I opted to use hulled barley. Most often the kind of barley found in the supermarket is "pearled" barley, and most commonly the "quick cooking" kind. "Pearled" means that the outer, inedible grain case, the inner hull and the bran have all been polished off or "pearled," so there is little fiber left to the grain. I look for ways to incorporate more fiber in our diets, so I found "hulled" barley, which has not had the bran or inner hull removed, but only the outer inedible hull or shell. It takes a little longer to cook, but since I always looked for the long-cooking pearled barley anyway, the time to cook is not much different. 

So, in creating a grain and lentil dish, I used hulled barley, moong dal (mung beans that have been peeled and split) and added in some cabbage. I look for ways to get cabbage and other cruciferous vegetables into my husband's diet without him really being able to pick it out (in the case of cauliflower, for example, which I shred) or truly taste it. In this instance, I got rave reviews from him on both the Korma dish and this Barley Khichdi. High praise, indeed!

Barley Khichdi

Barley Khichdi

Barley Khichdi

Serves 3 to 4

½ cup hulled barley
¼ teaspoon turmeric powder
½ cup moong dal
1 tablespoon oil or ghee
½ teaspoon cumin seeds, whole
½ teaspoon asafetida
1 - 2 shallots, minced
1 - 2 cloves fresh garlic, minced
1½ cups finely shredded cabbage
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
pinch Kashmiri red chili powder, or more if you like heat

Place the barley into a large saucepan with 2 cups water and bring to boil. Add the turmeric and cook over low heat for 20 minutes. Rinse the moong dal in water repeatedly until the water drains off mostly clear. Drain well and add to the barley, with a little more water only if needed. Cook for about 10 more minutes, until both the barley and dal are tender, not mushy. If there is still water in the pan, either drain it, or if it is very little, simply turn off the heat and leave the pan on the burner to dry out.

In a skillet, heat the oil or ghee and once hot, add the cumin seeds and asafetida and let them sizzle for a bit. Add in the shallot and saute until the shallots are well softened. Add the garlic and saute for a minute or two, until fragrant, then add in the cabbage, salt, pepper and chili powder. Saute, stirring until the cabbage is tender, about 5 minutes, then add the contents of the skillet to the saucepan of barley mixture and stir well. Garnish with cilantro or curry leaves, if desired. 



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Barley Makes a Great Base for a Meal

With summer fast approaching, we all look to find recipes that take less time spent over a hot stove. If cooking is needed, then at least cooking a pot of barley is on top of the stove, and doesn't need close watching. 

We often overlook alternative grains as making up the base of a meal, and barley is so tasty. It takes about an hour to cook it through, unless you prefer the quick-cooking variety. I always try to buy the long cooking sort, but that is just the way I roll. Barley has a nice chewiness to it, giving something to sink your teeth into. For me, that makes it "feel" like I am getting more out of the meal, somehow. 
 

Barley Salad with Corn & Mango

To Roast, or Not to Roast?

I like adding in roasted red and green bell peppers to the mix, but if it's just too hot to deal with roasting the peppers and peeling them, simply use a jar or two of roasted red peppers, drained and chopped, and then a little can or two of chopped green chilies.

And then the corn. I admit, roasted ears of fresh corn are amazingly good. If you have the grill going anyway, roasting the corn is great. But if it is too hot and getting the grill going, or even standing near it feels like some level of hell's fire, then just use a can or corn, well drained. 

Barley Salad with Corn & Mango

Fresh Fruit?

I love mango, so I use mango in this salad. You could substitute things like papaya, peach, apricot, or even strawberries, if the salad will be eaten in short order. Strawberries won't look so good if the salad is leftover, and this does make a lot of barley salad.

So, What's Left?

All that is really left are the seasonings that make all these flavors come together in such a pleasing way. Lime juice, cumin, black pepper, olive oil. Scallions for a nice oniony crunch. Just a bit of cider vinegar to add piquancy.

And then, while this is an amazing side dish at any time of year, if you add in some store-bought rotisserie chicken, you've got a meal with minimal fuss. Rotisserie chickens are widely available at the grocery these days, and they make a quick and easy recipe addition. Simply remove all the skin and bones and add in the chicken - in large chunks or chopped. This is so good - you just have to try it!

Barley Salad with Corn & Mango

Barley Salad with Corn & Mango

Serves about 8

1 cup pearl barley
8 cups water
2 teaspoons salt
1 red bell pepper
1 green bell pepper (or use a Poblano)
2 ears corn, husked
6 to 8 scallions, chopped
1 large mango, peeled, diced
2 to 4 tablespoons chopped cilantro, to taste
¾ teaspoon ground cumin
¼ cup fresh lime juice
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
Fresh cracked pepper, to taste
1 tablespoon olive oil
Rotisserie Chicken, optional

Bring the water to a boil, add in the salt and cook the barley according to package directions, till al dente. Drain the barley and place into a large bowl.

Roast the peppers until blackened. Place them into a zip-top bag and seal; steam for a few minutes until cool enough to handle. Peel the skins, discard the seeds and stem. Chop the peppers and add to the barley. Alternately, use a jar or two of roasted red bell peppers, drained and chopped, and a small can or two of chopped green chilies.

Roast the corn over a hot grill until quite a few kernels are nicely browned. Slice the kernels from the cob and add to the barley. Alternately, drain a can of whole kernel corn and add to the barley.

Add in the scallions, mango and cilantro. In a small bowl, whisk together the cumin, lime juice and apple cider vinegar, then whisk in the oil. Pour over the salad and toss well to combine. Let the salad stand for at least a half hour before serving.

If using the chicken, remove skin and bones and discard. Chop the meat as desired and add to the salad, mixing well to combine.



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

A Grain Salad with Barley using Ferments

Last week I used up some leftover wild rice to make a side "salad" dish for a really wonderful Kalbi Flank Steak; both recipes were posted 3 days ago. I love grain "salads" though I don't make them terribly often. I had gone for labs last week also, and found my cholesterol is a bit high. In researching foods that help with the LDL side of things, barley was mentioned in many different sites, because of its soluble fiber. While my husband will not go straight for a grain salad, he will eat them. Yesterday when I made this salad he ate other things he preferred, so it was my side dish. Tonight it will be my main dish as he will not be home for dinner and I often go meatless.

Barley Salad with Fermented Red Onion

I initially set some barley to cook without any true idea of what I was going to do with it. As it cooked, I started thinking of how good the Wild Rice and Corn Salad turned out and realized I still had the other half of the red and green bell peppers I had used in the Wild Rice and Corn Salad, so obviously I would use those in this Barley Salad. The other thing I thought of, after the fact, was that I had a jar of fermented Red Onion Relish in the fridge and had yet to use it. I am sure it would have made an excellent addition to the Wild Rice and Corn Salad, had I remembered it. I also have a jar of Fermented Jalapeno Slices in the fridge and I love a little bit of piquant heat in my foods. 

With these two fermented foods in mind, I decided that this time I was going to use them in this new salad, so these items went into my list. Since I am making fermented foods all the time, I have a lot of them to eat so I may as well use them in recipes. Please understand, if you have not

Pickled Red Onions

jumped onto the fermented Foods Bandwagon, it is no big deal. Another relish of choice would also work, as well as chopped up Pickled Red Onions, which are much quicker to make. If neither of these is available, they can be left out completely. 

A few of the ingredients in the Wild Rice and Corn Salad went into this new Barley Salad, though with small variations the flavors went in a completely different direction. I eliminated the corn completely, kept the Feta cheese, scallions and cilantro. I substituted the pine nuts with pumpkin seeds and added in some dried cranberries (craisins). The dressing started out basically the same, using olive oil and lime or lemon juice. I also used the Sichuan peppercorns, just because I have them. These can easily be left out. 

One other ingredient that occurred to me at the last moment was probably one that just absolutely "made" this dish: Kalamata Olive Tapenade. I posted this recipe in April of this year, but will post it here again, because if you like olives, you really must try this out. It is so good, and so very easy to make. And, what an amazing thing to add to this vinaigrette-type dressing!

Kalamata Olive Tapenade

Kalamata Olive Tapenade

7 - 8 ounces pitted Calamata/Kalamata olives, drained
2 tablespoons fresh parsley, finely minced
2 large cloves garlic, chopped
¼ cup olive oil (more, or less, as desired)

Place the olives, parsley and garlic in a food processor to finely chop. With processor running, add in olive oil until the mixture is at the consistency you prefer. 


Here is the recipe I made last evening for Barley Salad with Fermented Red Onion:

Barley Salad with Fermented Red Onion

Serves 8 or more

Barley Salad with Fermented Red Onion

1 cup pearl barley (long-cooking kind)
3 cups water
1 teaspoon salt
½ green bell pepper (about ¾ cup), chopped
½ red bell pepper (about ¾ cup), chopped
½ cup Fermented Red Onion Relish
½ cup crumbled Feta cheese
½ cup cilantro, chopped (or as desired)
¼ cup Fermented Jalapeno Peppers, minced
¼ cup dried cranberries (craisins)
¼ cup green pumpkin seeds
¼ cup finely chopped fresh ginger root
4 scallions, chopped
½ teaspoon more salt, if needed


DRESSING:
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons lime juice
1 teaspoon Sichuan Peppercorns, crushed, optional
1 tablespoon Kalamata Olive Tapenade

Set the barley to cook in a saucepan with the water and the teaspoon of salt. Lower heat and cover. Cook for about 50 to 55 minutes or until the barley is cooked to your taste.

Whisk together the dressing ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.


In a large mixing bowl, combine the bell peppers, Red Onion Relish, Feta cheese, cilantro, Jalapeno peppers, craisins, pumpkin seeds, ginger and scallions. Once the barley is cooked through, drain any excess water and allow the barley to cool slightly. Once cooled, combine the barley with the ingredients in the bowl and toss. Pour in the Dressing and toss well to coat. Taste for salt, adding more only if needed. The salad is best served at room temperature.



My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Another Soda Bread Recipe

I wrote a few days ago (the day before St Paddy's) about my take on Irish Brown Bread, or Soda Bread. Which turned out so wonderful, by the way, that I was just itching to try another recipe, this time using some barley flour. Since the loaf made a few days back is down to the last two slices remaining, I made a second loaf this morning. It was in the oven before I sat down to breakfast.

New this morning: Barley Flour Soda Bread

I will tell you why I so loved this first bread that I had to make a second loaf so soon after: It is moist and dense, chewy but not hard, smells sweet, somewhat like molasses, though there is none in the recipe, toasts beautifully, tastes great just with butter, goes excellently with stew (or eggs for breakfast, or a sandwich for lunch, if sliced thinly and for a lot more things, I am sure). I imagine you get my drift. I really loved this bread. And it is almost instant gratification. Only baking soda in the recipe, means no waiting for the bread to rise. 

Not that I have a problem with waiting for breads to rise. I have been making yeast breads for almost 45 years. I am well-used to the waiting part!

Irish Brown Bread; oats making little lines

As I mentioned in the blog on the first Irish Brown Bread, since I have an electric grain mill, I wanted to try this with barley flour. Not all barley flour, but just some. In that first bread, I used mostly whole wheat flour, with some all-purpose flour and cake flour, and then added in some toasted wheat germ and rolled oats. The oats caused the bread (seen at right) to have little lines running through the cut slices, which is no problem whatsoever. Still, this time I milled some whole pearled barley (the long-cooking kind) and wheat berries, and used all-purpose flour and cake flour as the other flours. No extra additions. I was tempted to add currants, but opted out at last minute. What I do need to do is find a source for some soft wheat rather than only the hard red wheat I currently have. That is for another day.

Once my second attempt this morning cooled enough to slice, I tasted a tiny corner (I had just finished with breakfast, but wanted to get some idea of flavor differences). I find that this one smells less of molasses (maybe it was the toasted wheat germ giving that flavor?) and has a more straightforward whole-grain flavor, but it is still nice and dense, moist and chewy, so I am very content. I might be on this kick for Soda Breads for a while, at this rate!

Barley Flour Soda Bread

And then this morning, reading further on soda breads, and other things, I came on a site that talked of bicarbonate really first being used in the early American colonies in the later 1700s. So, how "original to Ireland" is Irish "Soda" Bread? Who knows? None of this really matters. What matters is that these breads come out so wonderfully good. Soda breads are known in many countries, including Serbia, from where my paternal grandparents haled (then Yugoslavia). I had no clue. Grandma never made soda bread, to my recollection. I believe she did occasionally make yeast bread, but that was not her "thing". Her thing was making pastries: rich, full of lard, flaky, not-too-sweet pastries. I can still taste them in my mind, though the last time I ate her pastries was in the early 1970s.  They were truly memorable. Who cares if bread baking was not her thing!?

Long and short, if you have the ability to grind barley and wheat, these breads, or any using whole grain flour, taste immeasurably better if the grain is freshly ground. Store-bought whole wheat flour has always tasted awful to me, and now I realize that this is because, once ground, the germ goes rancid very quickly. I would not recommend making these recipes of mine unless you have a grain mill of some kind and can grind your own fresh grain. This is what I did this morning:

Barley Flour Soda Bread

Barley Flour Soda Bread

Makes one loaf

1 cup whole wheat flour

Barley Flour Soda Bread

1 cup whole grain barley flour
1 cup all-purpose unbleached flour
1 cup cake flour
½ teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 cups buttermilk

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a baking sheet and set aside. In a large mixing bowl stir together all the dry ingredients. Make a well in the center and pour in all the buttermilk. Stir, beginning in the center, with a wooden spoon, gradually incorporating all the dry ingredients, until no dry remains. Turn the mixture out onto a floured surface and "knead" gently by patting out the dough, folding it in half, flattening and folding, about 8 to 10 times. Form into a round loaf approximately 8-inches in diameter and 2-inches high. Set it in the prepared baking sheet. Cut a large "X" across the top (this allows for easier expansion and helps to have the loaf baked through in the center). Bake the loaf for about 50 to 60 minutes, until nicely golden and it sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom. If an instant read thermometer is among your kitchen gadgetry, the loaf should read at least 185 to 190 degrees in the center. Cool completely on a rack before cutting.
 


My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.

Happy St Paddy's Day with Irish Lamb Stew

Leprechaun hiding in mug

Yesterday I wrote about my adventure making Irish Brown Bread, or Soda Bread. I am so very pleased with the outcome of that recipe, and plan to repeat it, trying out a few other things; one most notably, the use of barley flour in some amount. That aside, today I am making an Irish type of lamb stew, for a tip of the hat to St. Paddy's Day.

As I wrote yesterday, when looking at a new recipe, most particularly one from a specific ethnicity, I try to get all the information about the background as possible before actually creating a recipe. I may or not accede to all the strictures, but I make my decisions from an informed standpoint. Hopefully. Again, looking up traditional recipes and background, I learned that firstly, the traditional meat is mutton. The peasant Irish would have kept the sheep until other uses were no longer viable (milk, wool) and then the animal might be butchered, and voila, mutton. Nowadays, mutton is hard to come by, so the most selected meat to use is lamb shoulder. I only had access to what is available in my freezer. Either I cut up another leg of lamb, or use the stew-type cut called chislic in these parts. Unfortunately, chislic comes with an excessive amount of fat, so I spent time cutting as much off as possible.

In general, recipes for Irish Lamb Stew abound. There are recipes from many famous chefs as well as others like me, writing a blog and learning. Many of the recipes I read online called for using a dark beer such as Guinness Stout for some, if not all, the cooking liquid. I thought, "What a great idea!" And then when I came to read some admonitions about what an Irish peasant may have done long ago, using beer in their stew was absolutely not done. Much like with using butter in the Soda Bread, where the thought was that they'd rather slather butter on the finished bread than waste it in the recipe - the same goes for beer. Beer in the stew? Heavens no, they would rather drink it, when available. It seems that a true authentic Irish stew is made with mutton, onions, potatoes and water. The additions of barley and/or carrots is argued to give the "wrong" flavors. Oh well. While I like to adhere to basics as much as possible, I do like carrots and barley, so I opted to use them.

Irish Lamb Stew and Brown Bread

Up until this morning, I still had not set down definite amounts for the stew. When I make a stew of any kind, more often than not I am tossing things in until it looks "right" to me. I make a pile of something that seems a good amount, then measure it to write down the amounts. This is what I did with this stew. Another thing about traditional Irish Stew; the fat used. It is stipulated that the meat should not be fatty. Most old recipes do not call for browning the meat (I enjoyed this site and the information through the years), but instead layering it with onion and potatoes. I think I saw mention of a knob of butter somewhere in my reading, but generally, all the stew ingredients are placed into a pot, well covered and sealed and stewed slowly. I did use fat to brown the meat, dredged in flour. I do not often dredge meat in flour and had not initially planned to do this.

This required browning, and the only oil I keep is olive, which I do not believe would give a traditional flavor, much as I love olive oil! Browning in butter would just burn the butter, so I scrapped that idea. Instead, I used bacon fat. Maybe not traditional, but then neither is browning!  One thing that occurred while browning the dredged meat: a LOT of fond. It was so dark, though not - quite - burned, that when I added in a bit of water to loosen it up, it created the most beautiful, and beautifully fragrant, base for the stew. I added onion and garlic to this mixture and stewed them for about 20 minutes while prepping the other ingredients. The whole pot, once assembled, smelled heavenly.

Nicely thickened Irish Stew

If lamb is unavailable, beef stew meat can be substituted, by the way. The best pot to use is an enameled cast iron. It heats wonderfully and does not burn food easily.

I had planned to make a small pot of lamb stock to use as the liquid in the stew. And then I forgot. I had one bone from a leg of lamb just waiting in the freezer, so I pulled it out this morning and set it in a 375 degree oven for an hour to brown it. This bone I set into the center of the stew pot, to hopefully also lend its magical flavors. I am anticipating a wonderfully redolent pot of stew for dinner tonight, with some flavorful Brown Bread alongside.

My Irish Lamb Stew

Irish Lamb Stew

Serves 6 to 8

2 pounds lamb shoulder meat, or other lamb stew meat
½ cup flour, for dredging
1 teaspoon salt
few grinds of pepper
2 tablespoons bacon fat, or other oil
1 cup water or beef stock
1 large onion, cubed
1 - 2 cloves garlic, minced
2 cups celery, sliced
1½ cups peeled, sliced carrots
½ cup chopped parsley
¼ cup long-cooking barley
1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves, chopped
2 bay leaves
1 teaspoon salt
more pepper if desired
5 cups water or stock
2 pounds potatoes

All done!

Preheat oven to 275 degrees, or whatever temperature will maintain a low simmer. Cut the meat into chunks, if it is not, already. Mix the flour, 1 teaspoon of salt and some pepper and dredge the meat in this mixture. Heat an enameled cast iron pot (preferable, if available) over medium high heat and add in 1 tablespoon of oil or bacon fat. Brown half the beat, removing to a plate. Brown the second half of the meat and remove to the plate. Add 1 cup of water or stock to the pot and stir, scraping up the deep brown bits stuck to the bottom of the pot. Add in the onion and garlic and stir, allowing this to cook gently while prepping the celery & carrots. Once ready, add the meat back into the pot along with the celery and carrots. Add the parsley, barley, thyme, bay leaves, the extra teaspoon salt, more pepper if desired and the 5 cups of water or stock. Let the stew come to a gentle boil. Peel and cut into very small chunks one of the potatoes and add in. This is to help with thickening the stew. Cover with a tight fitting lid and set into the oven to cook slowly for 1 1/2 to 2 hours. Peel and cut the remaining potatoes into larger chunks and add to the stew. Cover and return the pot to the oven for at least another hour, or until the potatoes are cooked through.
Too many ingredients? Maybe. This stew suited my husband and me just fine, regardless.


My passion is teaching people how to create a harmony of flavors with their cooking, and passing along my love and joy of food, both simple or exotic, plain or fancy. I continue my journey in ethnic and domestic cuisines, continuing my journey to explore diverse culinary experiences and hopefully to start you on a journey of your own. Join me also at A Harmony of Flavors on Facebook, and Pinterest.