Provencal Beef Stew

What better way to warm up than with tender beef stew? Especially with this dreadful winter we are experiencing here in NY state !! I think that if I don't see another snowflake in my entire life I'll be happy....Really we want Spring!!!!

Anyways...Since winter and it's bad weather are still around, might as well enjoy a nice and hearty plate of steamy stew, and this one became my family's favorite and I hope it will become yours too.

Provencal Beef Stew :

• 4 tbsp olive oil
• 2 onions, chopped
• 4 cloves garlic, finely sliced
• 2 lbs stewing beef, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 2 x 400 g tins of canned chopped tomatoes
• 1/2 cup of red wine

• 1 tsp sugar
• 1 1/2 lbs new potatoes, (unpeeled), larger ones halved
• 2 tbsp capers, drained and rinsed
• 2 tbsp pitted and chopped black olive
• 1 tbsp chopped thyme and rosemary

Preheat the oven to 350F

Pour the olive oil into a large casserole dish or ovenproof saucepan with a lid on a medium–high heat and, when hot, add the onions and garlic and season with salt and pepper. Fry for 6–8 minutes or until the onions are soft and lightly golden. 

Tip in the beef and stir in the dish or pan for 2–3 minutes to brown the meat, add the wine and boil until reduced, then in go the tomatoes, sugar and herbs. Bring to the boil, then cover with a lid and cook in the oven for 1 hour. 

After 1 hour remove from the oven, season with a little more salt, then stir in the potatoes, cover and return to the oven for another hour or until the beef is tender and the potatoes are cooked through. Stir in the capers, olives taste for seasoning and serve. 

Enjoy!!!

Bread Pudding

Every week end for the last few years (well for at least 10 years!!!) breakfast was either french toast, pancakes or waffles, not too bad you'll tell me!! But it was time to add another friend to the list. This bread pudding is so easy to make and so delicious that I have been making it at least once a week. In this last one I used challah bread, but I made it with leftover brioche and with croissants as well. It's not the most friendly breakfast out there, but O so delicious!!

Bread pudding :

• 10 thick slices of challah bread
• 1/4 cup of melted butter
• 1/2 cup golden raisins
• 5 large eggs
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tsp. pure vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon
• Pinch of ground nutmeg
• Pinch of salt
• 4 cups of milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Cut your bread into small pieces into an 9 inch by 12 inch baking pan. Drizzle melted butter over bread. Sprinkle with raisins.

In a mixing bowl, combine eggs, milk, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and vanilla. Beat until well mixed. Pour over bread, and lightly push down with a fork until bread is covered and soaking up the egg mixture.

Bake in the preheated oven for 45 minutes, or until the top springs back when lightly tapped.

And enjoy either for breakfast or dessert!!

Banana and chocolate chips pancakes

Have you ever find yourself with a bunch of over ripe bananas because all of a sudden your kids are "tired" of eating bananas just after they asked for them????

I don't know for you, but for me as much as I love making and eating banana bread, it can get a little bit old after the 3rd one, even smeared with peanut butter or nutella!!! So I decided to try and make pancakes (I have kids that will eat pancakes at every meal!!) with all my lonely bananas.

So here I am, googling recipes for banana pancakes and all the recipes I found and liked were using sliced bananas on top of the pancakes, which my kids will never eat, what I wanted was pancakes with mashed bananas. So I decided to make my own recipe with what I knew about pancake making. So here goes...

Banana and chocolate chips pancakes

Ingredients :

1 1/2 cup flour
1 tbsp. of sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 1/12 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup mashed banana
1 egg
2 tbsp. melted butter
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup chocolate chips

In a bowl mix all the dry ingredients, add the chocolate chips.

In another bowl whisk the egg, add the mashed banana, the buttermilk, melted butter and vanilla. Pour into dry ingredients and mix until just blended, don't worry if you have some lumps in your batter!!!

Using a ladle pour pancake batter in pools 2 inches away from one another, you can make them as big or small as you want...When pancakes have bubbles on top and dry around the edges flip then over, cook them for another minute or so. Repeat until no more batter is left.

And serve warm.

Hope you will enjoy them as much as we do here!!!