Recipe Review! Loaded Vegetable Beef Stew

well, i made this one the other night after a long day. i was in a pretty foul mood, so i was afraid the bad joo-joo might ruin the recipe.

i was wrong, though!

it was a good one...although, i learned an important lesson about really reading the ENTIRE recipe. this one had a few more steps than i thought, so it took longer to prepare than i had really wanted to spend on it.

8 bacon strips, diced
3 pounds beef stew meat, cut into 1 in. cubes
6 medium carrots, cut into 1 in. pieces
6 medium tomatoes, peeled and cut into wedges
4 medium potatoes, peeled and cubed
3 cups cubed, peeled butternut squash
2 medium green peppers, chopped
2 tsp dried thyme
2 garlic cloves, minced
2 cans (14-1/2 oz each) beef broth
6 cups chopped cabbage
1/2 tsp pepper


1. in a large skillet, cook bacon over med heat until crisp. remove to paper towels to drain, leaving the drippings in the pan. brown beef in batches in the bacon drippings. refrigerate bacon until serving.

2. in a 5-qt slow cooker, combine carrots, tomatoes, potatoes, squash, green peppers, thyme, and garlic. top with beef. pour broth over top. cover and cook on low for 8 hours.

3. stir in cabbage and pepper. cover and cook on high for 30 mins until cabbage is tender. sprinkle each serving with bacon.

so, i didn't get the butternut squash, so ours went without. i also used red potatoes, which are a lot smaller and took a lot longer to peel and cut. they were good in the stew, though.

also, peeling tomatoes is hard.

in the end, it was really flavorful and we have a lot for left overs. i think it will be good served over rice or noodles, might try that tonight.

i wish i had known that i was going to need to make bacon, then brown beef, and then cut up all the veggies...it took a while to prepare. definitely not what i wanted to do when i got home from a long day at work and advising "stuff" in bee gee. it was worth it, though. and we'll have this recipe again!