What's On My Table: Beef Bourguignon

One of my passions is to show that healthy, whole food eating doesn't mean boring and flavorless food! That's not a way to live.  You shouldn't have to choose between healthy and delicious! On Thursdays, I'm doing a series here called "What's On My Table" like I do on my IG account: @fasterwaywithrobin .  I will be using past recipes until my kitchen is back in order.  I hope you'll follow along!   Please give me recipes you would like to see cleaned up, and I'll add those to the rotation when I'm able.

Houston is about to have a huge cold snap, so if I had a working kitchen, Beef Bourguignon would be on my menu for Saturday.  It takes a little longer to make, so buy precut stew meat to cut down on prep time.  I love eating this for treat day on a thick slice of garlic rubbed toasted French bread, and then eating the leftovers (without the bread) on low carb day.  It's one of those recipes that makes your house smell incredible, and it tastes even better leftover.  I love making this for company or large gatherings.

Clean Beef Bourguignon

This base recipe comes from Ina Garten with tweaks I've made to keep it clean.

8 oz SUGAR FREE bacon (I use Pederson's)

2 1/2 lbs stew meat (1 inch cubes)

Kosher salt 

Pepper

1 pound petite baby carrots 

2 yellow onions, sliced

1 T garlic, minced

1 bottle dry red wine (I use 2 buck chuck Merlot from Trader Joe's)

2-4 c beef broth

1 T tomato paste

1/2 t dried thyme

4 T vegan butter

1 1/2 T arrow root starch

1 lb fresh mushrooms (I like baby bellas), washed, stems removed and sliced

Method:

*Preheat oven to 250 degreed F

1. Cook your bacon in a Dutch oven. Reserve on a paper towel lined plate.

2. Salt and pepper stew meat and then brown in bacon fat. Reserve with bacon.

3. Toss carrots and onions and 1 T salt into the Dutch oven and cook 10-15 minutes.  Add garlic and cook for 1 minute more.

4. Add meat into pot and then crumble the bacon into the pot.

5. Add wine (yes, the ENTIRE bottle ;) ), and beef broth until meat is covered.  Then add thyme and tomato paste and bring to a simmer.

6. Place lid on Dutch oven and put stew in the oven for 1 1/4 hour.

7. Melt 2 T of vegan butter and combine with the arrowroot starch. Stir into Dutch oven. (You can skip this step but it won't be thick the first day).

8. Saute mushrooms in last 2 T of butter and add them to the pot. Stir to combine.

Serve over toasted French bread that has been rubbed with fresh garlic, with egg noodles, or by itself.  My kids prefer it over the noodles, and Taylor and I eat it with bread for treat day and as a stew on low carb days.

This is my longest recipe, but don't be intimidated by it's length.  Each step is super easy, and I promise it's worth it!

Mourning the Small Things

#tbt to the place I miss the most, to a time when I didn’t even consider the possibility of owning a mask or giving someone a wide berth when walking down Front Street. A time when you could smile at strangers and they could actually see your whole face and smile back.

Most days we wear our masks and get on with life as normal as best as we can, but yesterday, one of my kids broke down. He had had enough. He needed to mourn. Mourn the fact that Covid has changed our world and given us a new normal that means if someone has a sniffle, things are canceled. And he’s tired of things being canceled. We both are.

I told him I could relate. Yesterday I walked into a restaurant without a mask. This was completely unintentional. My scattered self has done this a couple times before (ALWAYS on accident), but this time was different.

I was confronted immediately by an employee demanding that I put on my mask. I was embarrassed and then I was angry. I wanted to shout at her, “this is NOT normal!”

Don’t worry, I didn’t. #enneagram9

I walked back out and got my mask and processed my reaction.  Usually I'm a happy little rule follower, but it hit me afresh that wearing a mask is NOT normal.   And while I understand why we wear them, I hadn’t really allowed myself to grieve the, yes small, but in many ways profound loss of freedom that cute fabric from Athleta represents. It is a daily, sometimes, hourly reminder every time we leave the house that something is not right in the world.  And when we don't take the time to mourn, to allow ourselves to feel sad, the grief turns into anger or bitterness and the bigger loss is that we miss out on the comfort of the Lord (Matthew 5:4).

 

I reminded my child (and myself), that we mourn but not without hope and not without comfort. And as believers we look at our suffering through a different lens than the world. Instead of asking, “God, why are you doing this to me?” We ask Him, “God, what are you doing?” Asking Him to open our eyes, hearts, and minds to the good we see Him bringing about in these bizarre times we are living in instead of just waiting for everything to go back to a normal that might not come.

God what are you doing? 

This question takes trusting Him that the path He has us on is right. He is not surprised that there is a worldwide pandemic.  He has not stopped being able to use what was meant for evil for good (Genesis 50:20). We trust Him with the big picture - that He has the end planned, and we can only see the piece of the path we need to see in this moment. And He is with us (Psalm 23:5).

We can trust Him because what looked like the biggest train wreck in the history of the world, the Cross, was the very thing He used to save us.

So we mourn our losses big and small. Process them through prayer and conversations with empathetic friends.  We have a God who leads us in paths of righteousness, comforts us through the valley of the shadow of death, and walks with us on every part of the journey.

If you’re struggling with this too, I highly recommend Psalm 23, Genesis 37-50, Romans 8 for meditation.