i had clipped this recipe from an issue of Martha Stewart Living a few years ago and never made it. considering the foul weather we've had here in boston recently, a stew seemed like the perfect thing to make for dinner last night. a meatless stew, and it's delicious.i had forgotten to buy the three tomatoes it called for, but had a pound of grape tomatoes that i used instead. cutting each one in half took a while, and gave the stew the appearance of having lots of tomatoes. and my sprig of rosemary had gotten a little fuzzy in the fridge, so i substituted about 2 tsp of crushed rosemary. and i used 4 oz of pre-sliced baby bellas instead of the white mushrooms.
it's a surprisingly quick recipe. prep all the ingredients beforehand, and sweat the onions and mushrooms while the porcinis soak. then everything just falls into place. my version was much darker than the one pictured in martha's recipe. its probably due to the darker-than-usual chicken broth i used for soaking the porcinis (kitchen basics brand). the resulting porcini liquid was a deep dark brown with a savory, earthy fragrance. the combination of this earthy broth and the rosemary was perfect.
one thing that's missing in the recipe is salt. taste the stew while it's simmering and be sure to add a bit of salt while it's still cooking. i added about 2 tsp or so. and a couple of turns of the pepper mill.
crusty bread is a must for this! it soaks up that yummy juice, and gives the meal a good chew. we also made roasted cauliflower, which is one of the easiest and simplest side dishes you can make. it's one of our favorites.
double this recipe because you'll want to eat it for days.
No comments:
Post a Comment