As I mentioned a while ago, each month, I go to our town common to exchange an empty cooler for a full one as part of the meat CSA we participate in. Although we are almost certain to receive some standard stuff, like chicken and ground beef, there’s always something included that I am somewhat unfamiliar with. It’s a fun way to explore new recipes and learn about cooking something different.
There’s a small problem that has made cooking these items a little more difficult that expected. They are frozen, which generally means I need to plan ahead. As I mentioned in my resolutions post yesterday, I haven’t been so good at doing that. With the intention of doing much better with that in the new year, I took out some lamb stew meat and set out to find a great recipe that I could make in my slow cooker. We had an afterschool playdate planned, and I knew it would be the perfect time to come home to a homemade meal.
I found this recipe on Eating Well, and adapted it for our use, based upon our preferences and the ingredients I was able to get:
Slow Cooker Lamb Stew
- Lamb stew meat (the recipe called for 2 lbs, but our meat isn’t labeled by weight. I’m estimating it was about 2 lbs. I cut the lamb into 1 inch cubes, trimming most of the fat.
- 3 stalks of celery, cut into about 1 inch pieces
- 6 potatoes, peel on, cut in about 1 inch pieces.
- 14-ozs of water (the recipe called for chicken broth, but we didn’t have any. It didn’t make a difference in flavor at all).
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon papper
- 1 teaspoon dried thyme
I added it all to the crockpot, and cooked it on low for about 8 1/2 hours. The recipe also called for parsley on top, and although I had some fresh parsley, I completely forgot to add it.
I’m now requiring that my kids at least try every meal we make, so all four of us ate this. The kids actually really liked it too. We were able to get four meals (two adult portions, two smaller kid portions) out of it, and we’ve frozen another two adult portions. I’ll definitely make it again the next time we get lamb stew meat in our CSA cooler.
