A Simple and Wonderful Lamb Stew

The False Fat Diet

I have been absent from blogging for a while now, and hopefully I am back! Various things happened to cause the absence. Though none of them absolutely prevented me from coming up to my office to blog, it just became difficult to manage. One was that I went on a juice fast for 6 days. I wanted to purge, cleanse and hopefully relieve some of the edema I'd been having. I was following a book called "The False Fat Diet," by Elson Haas. I had followed this juice fast in the past, back when I originally bought the book, but it has been a very long time since then. I dropped 13 pounds of water, so thankfully, the edema is at bay, for now.

Then, just as I was coming to the end of the fast, my husband was once again in the hospital, and we had a bit of a scare there. Everything appears to be good for now, and since he's home, we have been following the Elimination Diet, also from that book. Basically, keeping most of the common food items that can cause sensitivity in the body out of our diet. So we are eating a whole lot of fresh vegetables (not my hubby's favorites!), very little meat (mostly chicken, turkey, fish and a little lamb), and some rice (mainly brown rice, or blended whole grain rice), quinoa or other complex grain or lentil and some fruits. Absolutely no wheat, corn, soy, eggs, dairy, cane sugar.

Lamb Stew

This is no news for me, because I have followed much of these foods all along, but also with all the offending possibilities like desserts, cheese (oh, how I love cheese), eggs and bread (though I eat only my own homemade whole grain breads). My husband, on the other hand - well - this is like totally uncharted waters. He is doing his best to follow and eat what I give him. Sometimes with more success than others, such as a cod fish stew that I just love, but he took two bites and asked if he could please eat something else!
 

Lamb Stew

All this in consideration, I have been coming up with new ways to accomplish things. I made almond milk so he could have it added to his oatmeal in the morning and was left with all the almond pulp. I kept is, because it is fiber, after all. When I made a lamb stew, I got thinking about how to thicken the stew, because my husband prefers soups and stews to be thick or at least thickened. Runny liquids just do not fit the bill. And since I had the almond pulp in the fridge, I thought of some of the Indian recipes I have made that call for pureeing nuts as part of the thickener for a curry. 

While I realize that not just everyone has almond pulp in their fridge (though making almond milk is so simple it seems everyone should make it), this Lamb Stew that I want to share is easily thickened with wheat flour, cornstarch, rice flour or even arrowroot, among other things. Or, if you do not have the need for a thickened stew, then just leave out the almond pulp.

All in all, the stew came out do absolutely delicious that I would very readily make it again. If you are not able to find lamb stew meat, or if you don't care for lamb, just substitute with beef. 

Lamb Stew

Lamb Stew 

Serves 4 

¾ pound lamb stew meat, in small cubes
1 tablespoon coconut oil
1 medium onion, chopped
3 cloves fresh garlic, minced
1½ cups carrots, in small cubes
1½ cups butternut squash, peeled, seeds removed, cubed
4 cups water
2 sprigs fresh thyme
1 bay leaf
¼ cup red lentils
½ cup fresh parsley, chopped
½ cup almond pulp, optional
2 teaspoons salt
1½ cups frozen peas, thawed

In a large heavy stew pot, melt the coconut oil and add in the lamb pieces. Stir and toss until well browned. Add in the onion and garlic and cook, stirring occasionally for about 5 minutes, until fragrant. Add in the carrots, squash, water, thyme, bay leaf, lentils, parsley, almond pulp and salt. Bring to boil, then reduce to a temperature that will maintain a simmer. Cover tightly and simmer very slowly for about 2 hours. When ready to serve, add in the peas and stir, allowing them to heat through. If desired, serve with a small amount of rice.


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.