Beef and Barley Stew

This Christmas one of my favourite Christmas gifts from my husband was an Instant Pot. It's a pressure cooker, slow cooker, rice cooker, sauté pan, steamer and stockpot warmer all in one and it's AWESOME! This isn't meant to be an ad for the pot so I'll just say that I totally love it and leave it at that.

I can cook meals quickly and efficiently using the pressure cooker feature, which comes in handy when I only have at most about an hour to get dinner on the table during the week. In the month and a half since Christmas I've already made a number of curries, stews, stocks, and risottos in a fraction of the usual stove-top time!

Most recently I made a very hearty beef and barley stew. It could be easily turned into a soup by adding extra chicken or beef stock at the end of cooking. The grownups of the family enjoyed it and I packed the leftovers for my lunches. Hubby added some sriracha sauce to his portion to spice it up a bit.

The kids on the other hand --who are usually suspicious of dishes where the ingredients are chopped small and all mixed together (since you never know what I might have tried hiding in there!)-- each took the required "no thank you" spoonful to taste, and opted for cheese omelets instead.

Beef and Barley Stew
Inspired by this one and Alton Brown's

• 1 1/4 lbs lean ground beef
• 1 (28 ounce) can diced tomatoes (or crushed if you don't like tomato chunks)
• 2 1/2 cups beef stock 
• 1/2 cup barley
• 3 large carrot, sliced
• 2 stalks celery, sliced
• 1 large potato, cubed
• 1 medium onion, diced 
• 1 clove garlic, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
• 1/2 teaspoon dried rosemary
• 1/2 teaspoon dried marjoram
• salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste

Directions:

1. Brown the beef in the pressure cooker. Drain off the fat.
2. Add the tomatoes, stock and barley. 
3. Close pressure cooker and bring up to full pressure. Pressure cook for 10 minutes 
4. While the soup is cooking, slice the carrots, peel and dice the potato and onion and mince the garlic.
5. After the soup has cooked for 10 minutes, use the quick-release and add the vegetables, herbs, and salt and pepper to taste. (I didn't add any extra salt since my stock was already salty.)
6. Seal the cooker and bring up to full pressure again. Pressure cook for another 10 minutes.
7. Open using quick release method. 
8. Add extra heated broth if you'd prefer a soup rather than a stew.

Hash browns, fast food-style!

Since it's cold and snowy outside, I thought I might make some healthy porridge for breakfast and then blog about the rib-sticking high-fiber goodness, all the different grains we have, and what we top the bowls with... but I'll save that plan for another day.

Instead, my kids made a very specific and unusual breakfast request for cheeseburgers and "McDonald's potato patties." (Totally my fault, since I set the kids up with Netflix on my smartphone in bed in order to catch a few more zzz's and they chose an episode of SpongeBob SquarePants. That made them think about eating Krabby Patties with cheese, which of course led to the idea of cheeseburgers for breakfast.) Since it's the weekend and I just bought some ground beef yesterday, I decided to honor their non-breakfasty breakfast request and went googling for a potato patty recipe.

I found a very simple recipe that turned out just perfectly. While it's not exactly a healthy dish given the fact that it is pan fried in a bit of oil, I have no doubt that it came out healthier than if we'd gone to McD's for hash browns!

I did make some small cheeseburgers to go with them but they were eaten faster than I could whip out my phone for a picture!

Hash Browns

• 1 egg, beaten
• 4 medium potatoes, peeled 
• 1 medium onion
• salt and pepper
• vegetable oil for frying

Preparation method

1. Coarsely grate the potatoes and onion into a clean tea towel or strainer and then squeeze out the excess liquid. Place the mix in a large bowl.
   
2. Add the egg, a good couple of pinches of salt and freshly ground black pepper. Mix the ingredients well. (You need to salt the mix well otherwise the hash browns can be quite bland).
   
3. Heat a good glug of oil in a heavy based frying pan and when the oil is hot (but not smoking), add spoonfuls of the potato mixture into the pan and flatten into patties about 1cm thick. Flip over once browned and crispy - about 2-3 minutes each side.
   
4. Serve hot as a breakfast or supper side dish. Especially good with bacon and eggs. Or breakfast cheeseburgers.
   

Roast Chicken

Last August I decided that we weren't eating nearly enough homemade food. We used to cook a lot in the pre-kids olden days, but life had since gotten pretty busy and hectic and freezer meals from the grocery store and delivery food were so much simpler... and unhealthier... and more expensive... So my new school year's resolution was to start cooking more no matter how busy or rushed we might feel. Here we are about six months later and I've discovered that it's usually just as simple to throw something together from fresh ingredients... and healthier... and cheaper... and also a lot more fun!

One of the first dishes I made at the end of last summer was a whole roasted chicken complete with veggies and potatoes. It turned out beautifully yummy. And when the kids asked where it came from (since no one had rung the door bell to deliver it to our house), I knew I was on the right track!

Since then I've been roasting a chicken about once every two weeks. I love that we get a good meal out of it and still have enough leftovers to make something else like chicken salad sandwiches or chicken fried rice. When I'm feeling like spending a little more time in the kitchen I toss all the bones and some veggies into the pressure cooker after dinner to make some stock.

Sometimes I make the chicken in the pressure cooker using this recipe if we're working under time constraints and my chicken is small enough to fit in the pot. The chicken turns out really moist but not very pretty since I haven't figured out yet how to properly brown the chicken skin in the pressure cooker without all the skin getting blasted off at some point during the pressure cooking which results in a funny-looking naked chicken when the lid comes off. It's still tasty and moist but I serve it on a platter off the bone.

Tonight I made a roast chicken in the oven inspired by Jamie Oliver's recipe. I placed a few bacon strips on top of the chicken during cooking since I already had an open pack in the fridge from earlier this week, and they were the clear highlight of the dish for my kiddos. I think they would have been happiest if I'd just skipped the chicken altogether and simply fed them a half pack of bacon!

Roast chicken
inspired by Jamie Oliver

• ~2 kg/4lb whole chicken
• 2 medium onions
• 2-3 carrots
• 2 sticks celery 
• 1 bulb garlic (Yes, a whole bulb, not just a single clove. Garlic is good!)
• olive oil
• sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper
• 1 lemon
• 1 small bunch fresh thyme, rosemary, bay or sage, or dried poultry seasoning
   Preheat oven to 400F.

1. Chop the onions into quarters, the carrots and celery into finger length pieces, and peel all the garlic. Place it all in your roasting pan and drizzle with olive oil. 
2. Rinse and pat dry the chicken. Rub with olive oil and season with salt and pepper. 
3. Make many small cuts into the lemon, and then place that in the chicken cavity with the herbs.
4. Place the chicken on top of the vegetables and put in the oven for about 1 hour 20 minutes. 
5. After about 30-35 minutes, baste the chicken (or add bacon strips on top like I did tonight!). Also add in some quartered potatoes at this point if you'd like to cook your dinner all in the same pan. 
6. Give the potatoes and all the stray veggies a stir after another 30 mins and add a little water if the pan is looking dry so things don't burn. 
7. When the chicken is cooked based on your meat thermometer reading, remove from oven and let sit for about 15 minutes before carving.

Cheesy Broccoli Bacon Potato Bake

Very sad news this weekend for a nearby community that the St. Albert Cheese Factory burned down. St. Albert orange mild cheddar is a staple in our house and I occasionally spring for a bag of their cheese curds as well as a snack food for the kids or if we're going to make poutine. Here's a picture of the uniquely Canadian delicacy we made a few weeks ago with homemade fries, gravy from a mix and their fresh cheese curds.

At the grocery store tonight the clerk restocking the St. Albert cheese section said the product was selling very quickly. She said a woman came in just before me and bought over $200 worth of St. Albert cheese since the news reports are saying that it would take about a year for the factory to be up and running again.


So with cheese on my mind and a big bag of broccoli florets in the fridge I decided to go with a simple, yummy, not-so-healthy casserole including many of our favourite ingredients. How yummy was it? So yummy that my kids tried to pick out the bacon and cheesy broccoli bits straight from the cooking dish before their dad got home, and so yummy that there are no leftovers.

Cheesy Broccoli Bacon Potato Bake
adapted from this recipe 

• 5 slices bacon
• 1 small onion 
• 2 cups cubed potatoes
• 1 head broccoli
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup shredded mild cheddar + extra to sprinkle on top if you like cheese. We like cheese.

Directions:

1.  Preheat oven to 350F.
2. Fry 5 slices of bacon. Remove bacon, and drain some bacon grease into a clean bowl. Crumble the bacon once it's cool to the touch. 
3. In remaining bacon grease, fry onions for 1-2 minutes, add potatoes and broccoli, adding back some bacon grease if needed. Saute until fairly tender. Add in the crumbled bacon and remove from heat.
4.  Meanwhile, in a medium saucepan, melt butter. Whisk in flour, cook for a bit, and then slowly whisk in the milk. While continually stirring, bring to a boil and simmer until the sauce has thickened. Remove from heat and slowly stir in the shredded cheese until it's all melted. Add black pepper to taste. I don't add any extra salt since the cheese and bacon are already both quite salty.
5. Put the sauteed vegetables and crumbled bacon into a greased casserole dish. Pour the cheese sauce on top.
6. Bake at 350F for 30-40 minutes. If you're aiming for a super cheesy dish, around the 20 min mark sprinkle on extra shredded cheese.