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Never Ending Beef in Red Wine with Spinach


BlueStringPudding

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Yes, Tesco have had brisket on special offer again! So I’ve been enjoying another never-ending slow cooked dinner all week, so I thought I’d share it with you. This would work equally well with stewing steak. If you’ve got curry paste/spices and leftover wine in the cupboard, then you can make this for about a tenner. If not expect to spend around £14, to do about 13 meals.

 

Ingredients for phase one (Beef and Spinach in red wine):

Big slab of brisket or a pack of stewing steak

Loads of spinach

Three carrots

One red onion

One bulb of garlic

Half a bottle of cheap red wine

Thyme and Oregano (or other woody herbs)

Salt

Bouillon or stock cube

Oil

Water

 

 

 

And for phase two (rich lentil stew):

Red split lentils

Creamed coconut (sachet is easiest, or chop off a quarter of a block)

 

And for phase three (lentil/noodle curry):

Packet of noodles (I’ve used Zero noodles which are grain-free)

Curry paste or your preferred combo of cumin/turmeric/ground coriander/chilli

Tinned tomatoes / coconut milk / plain yoghurt (whichever you prefer)

Oil

 

You need a deep casserole dish with a lid or with foil.

 

 

 

This has lasted me a crazy number of meals already and it hasn’t run out yet. I’m on meal number 11, I think. :lol: And not sick of it yet.

 

Phase one:

1.On your cooker, put a little oil in the casserole dish and brown your beef on all sides along with the thyme.

2.While it's browning, slice your red onion, peel about 5 garlic cloves and cut them in half, and chop up your three carrots, and de-leaf the oregano.

3.When the beef is browned, take it out the pan and put it on a plate, while you add the onions and garlic to the same pan. Stir until the onions start to look glassy and then add all the veggies and herbs.

4.Then add the beef back to the pan, shuftying all the veggies round the sides if it's a slab of meat, so the meat sits right down in the pan.

5.Top the pan up with half a bottle of red wine and a teaspoon of bouillon (or stock cube) then add as much spinach to the pan as you can fit in. You can even mound it up on top because it’ll squidge down when cooking.

6. Put the lid on the top and bring it up to the boil. Turn down to a simmer then allow it to simmer for ten minutes on the cooker, this’ll evaporate off a lot of the alcohol in the wine. Give it a stir as the spinach mulches down.

7. After ten minutes of simmering, transfer the dish either to the top of your multifuel stove, or into a Wonderbag if you have one. This should reduce the heat to a nice slow cook.

8. Forget about it and go watch Columbo (other tele programmes are available)

9. After 3 hours, if using a slab of meat like brisket, lift it out of the casserole dish onto a plate, and slice it, removing the string, of course. As before, if cooked through nicely it should be easy to slice, if not it means it needs cooking a bit longer. Plop the sliced brisket back in the casserole dish and stir it into the red wine gravy. If using chunks of stewing steak you can go straight onto the next stage.

10. Have a taste of the gravy and add some salt if you think it needs it. Shove the lid back on and allow it to continue cooking for another 15 mins or so.

9. Ladle into a huge bowl along with the juice and some veggies – it’s very rich and really yummy. I got 8 meals with loads of meat out of this before I’d snarfed all the brisket and moved on to the next stage. (It was a big lump of brisket!)

 

As before, make sure you keep it chilled between servings, and reheat portions of it very thoroughly, because you don’t want to give yourself food poisoning after a few days.

 

 

 

Phase two:

1.Once you’re all beefed out and you fancy a change and have eaten all the meat, time for the next phase. Get a potato masher a moosh up what’s left in the pan – mine was just carrots onions, spinach and a small amount of the gravy by then.

2. Add a cupful of red split lentils and a sachet of creamed coconut.

2. Top up with plenty of water and on the cooker, bring it up to a good simmer, stirring all the while to dissolve the creamed coconut.

3. Leave to simmer for a further 15 minutes with a lid on. The lentils will soak up most of the water and the creamed coconut will add a thickening and sweetening quality to it. Give it another stir and have a taste – add some salt if needed. It should be quite a thick lentil stew and not very runny.

4. Snarf it down! The richness of the beef and red wine flavour will still be there, even without the meat. I had 2 meals of this before I moved on to the third stage, for a bit of variety.

 

Phase three:

 

  1. Fry a teaspoon/tablespoon (depends how feisty you like it) of curry paste in some oil in a small pan. Alternatively gently fry a combination of turmeric, ground coriander, cumin and chilli if you prefer your own combo. In the meantime put the casserole dish containing the remaining lentil stew on the cooker to warm up.
  2. Once smelling completely yummy (don’t allow the spices to burn), pour the curry paste and oil into the casserole dish and stir it into the lentil stew.
  3. Add your chosen liquid – tined tomatoes, coconut milk or plain yogurt each work well. If you want to add more red split lentils at this stage to make it go even further, if it’s looking a bit sparse, you can.
  4. Pop on a lid and simmer for 15 minutes. If using dried noodles, add those at this stage along with a cupful of water. (If you’d prefer to use rice instead of noodles, add it at this stage along with extra water. Personally I don’t like the texture of rice with lentils which is why I use noodles)
  5. After 15 mins, give it a taste and add salt if needed. If using fresh noodles, add them at this stage and simmer for another 5 mins (no need for extra water).
  6. It’s done! Snarf it down – a yummy, rich lentil noodle curry.
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