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| This is how Stew Batch #1 turned out - looking good!! |
My mom's parents made their living and
raised their 5 kids on a farm in North Carolina. They grew
cantaloupes, cotton, tobacco, and corn. They also ran a dairy, had
chickens, hogs, a very large German Shepherd guard dog and lots of
kitties running around the barn. Granny had a large “kitchen”
garden for the family and she spent many hours in a hot kitchen on
summer days, canning vegetables and fruit for the winter months. She
was an outstanding cook – plain and simple fare, but we all loved
visiting and eating at her house.
Once a year, Granny and Granddad would
make a Brunswick Stew. It was made in a large black kettle, over a
real wood fire, in the back yard. The women prepared the ingredients
and the men did the stirring. Mom remembers peeling & cutting up
buckets of potatoes. I can still remember standing around the fire
while the men stirred and talked, the large wooden paddle swirling
the contents of the kettle around and around. It was a magical time
for a little kid … the making of the stew.
And then, there was the eating.
Nothing has ever come close to tasting like the
Brunswick Stew out of that big black kettle. Back in those times, a
store-bought white bread, with its soft texture, was a treat …..
and so was a Pepsi …. and that is what accompanied a bowl of
Granny's Brunswick Stew. (Note – since you will not be bound by the
constraints of childhood memories and traditions, you may want to
have corn bread with this stew – it's wonderful).
Mom has always been on the lookout
for Brunswick Stew that comes close to the stew made on the farm.
There is a well-known brand that comes in a can and it used to be,
that doctored heavily with added spice and veggies, it would barely
pass muster in an emergency 'gotta-have-some-stew' attack –
recently, the quality has decreased to the point that it's not even
worth doctoring up. The small town fire departments in the area of
the old farm also make stew in black kettles to sell as fund raisers,
but now they use a gas fire ….. and the 'recipe' just isn't the
same as Granny's …. similar, but not the same. Lately, the quality
of these stews has become a disappointment as well.
Recently, in the quest for a passable
Brunswick Stew, we took Granny's recipe and using a
spreadsheet, broke the ingredients down to proportions that would fit
in crock pots (you need two). We made the first batch (later made a 2nd) and let it cook in the crock pots for 20 hours. It smelled like stew, it looked like stew, and finally .... it tasted really, really close to Granny's black kettle Brunswick Stew. Nothing will ever match her stew, but this is pretty darn close. Mom is happy and she is the official taste tester and quality control inspector. We broke out the white (wheat) bread and the Diet-Rite Colas (no Pepsi) .... dished up the bowls of stew .... and took a memory trip back to the farm!
So … here's the recipe ….. made
(almost) the way Granny made it, in smaller proportions and in crock
pots:
Granny's N.C. Brunswick Stew
Crock pots: two, 6-7 quarts each
(each will be about 3/4 full of stew)
Ingredients:
1-1/2 lbs of chicken (we used chicken
breasts)
1-1/2 lbs of stew beef (bought it
already cut up for stew)
1 onion (medium to large), diced
2-1/2 lbs of potatoes, peeled and diced
fairly small (red potatoes are what we used)
60 ounces of canned tomatoes (we used
2 (28 oz) cans of diced tomatoes & ½ cup of crushed tomatoes
(you could leave this ½ cup out or just use more diced tomatoes &
probably be ok)
2 (15 oz) cans of (small) lima beans
(drained)
2 (15 oz) cans of corn (drained)
32 oz. chicken stock
2 Tablespoons + 1 Tablespoon of sugar
(or to taste)
2 Teaspoons of ground black pepper (or
to taste)
2 Teaspoons of salt (or to taste)
¼ cup of butter (4 Tablespoons)
Optional: 4-6 shakes of Tabasco sauce,
Texas Pete or whatever you like (or to taste)
Directions:
The beef/chicken can be fresh or
frozen. Put the stew beef and chicken breasts in a large pot, add two
cups of water and boil it all until the chicken is very tender. The
stew beef will still be tough at this point, although it will be
totally cooked through. Dice up the chicken meat and split the
chicken meat and stew beef between the two crock pots . Take the
juice left over in the pot and split that between the crock pots as
well.
Peel and dice the potatoes & put
half in each crock pot.
Peel & dice the onion and put half
in each crock pot.
Drain and put 1 can of corn and 1 can
of lima beans in each crock pots.
Put a can of diced tomatoes (undrained)
in each crock pot.
Put 1/4 cup of crushed tomatoes in each
crock pot.
Add two cups of chicken stock to each
crock pot.
Put 1 tablespoon sugar, 1 teaspoon salt
& 1 teaspoon black pepper in each crock pot.
Add 2 Tablespoons butter or margarine (1/4 stick) to
each crock pot. (Note: don't leave this out – I skimped on it in
batch #1 & mom immediately said 'something is not right'. Just as
butter 'finishes' a sauce & gives it a rich, good 'mouth feel',
the butter has the same effect on the stew, plus I think it helps
keep the stew from sticking/burning to the sides of the crock pot)
Stir all to combine.
Turn crock pots on high for 1-2 hours
until stew is really cooking, then turn crock pots down to the next
setting (medium or low - however your crock pot works).
Let the stew cook for at least 12 hours
total - we went 20, but mom, in retrospect, thinks that's too long & the stew would taste better if cooked a few hours less. Stir occasionally and add chicken broth if the stew gets too
thick and looks like it needs more liquid to avoid burning (it might
get a dark ring around the edges). Of course, you can cook it for a
much shorter time, but you won't have anything near a real Brunswick
Stew. This long, slow cooking is critical to the taste and texture of
the stew.
After 12 hours, take a potato masher
and mash the stew until the meat is broken up and at least half or
more of the potatoes are mashed. The stew will be somewhat thick yet
still have some chunky vegetables.
To do the final seasoning adjustment,
we combined the stew from both crock pots in the bottom half of a
roasting pan and adjusted the seasoning for the batch as a whole.
Taste test the stew - add the 3rd tablespoon of sugar if you think you need it and the Tabasco or hot sauce (if you like some heat). Thin the stew with some chicken stock if it is too thick for your liking. Note: my mom is going for a particular taste remembered from childhood .... to stew batch #2, in addition to the seasonings mentioned in the ingredients, she added another teaspoon of black pepper, another teaspoon of sugar and we used a salt shaker to lightly sprinkle on a little salt (maybe an 1/8th of a teaspoon?) before she liked the final product. Since you are not trying to get to a "memory taste", just season (or not) until you like the result.
COOL the stew within two hours &
refrigerate or freeze. We set the roasting pan in a large cooler on
top of 5lbs. of ice that was dumped in it. We stirred the stew every
1/2 hour. After one hour (two stirrings), the stew was cool – we let
it go one more half hour & it was a bit 'chilled' and ready to
put into smaller containers for eating over the next couple of days
and/or freezing (it freezes well & is great to have on hand when unexpected company stops in!).
This makes about 5-6 quarts of stew.
