Irish Beef Stew

That's what I'm going to make tonight while Anna's teaching... I actually bought the stuff to make it this weekend while she was up in Maine, but I got lazy and just made frozen pizzas or bought burritos... whoops! I guess I was inspired (for the recipe not the laziness) by St. Patrick's Day or something (even though we didn't go out for it), but even more likely is that I just really like stews and have been wanting to make this for a while. It's Guinness based with chuck roast, potatoes, and carrots and not a whole lot else. It takes 2-3 hours which is mostly simmering in the oven time. The recipe itself is from The Best International Recipe which has been frankly a bit hit or miss compared to The New Best Recipe which is the most awesome cook book ever (no really!). However, where the The New Best Recipe makes shortcuts and ingredient substitutions for people who don't have access to fancy international markets, The Best International Recipe tends to be more traditional which can be really cool but also problematic if you don't know where to get fresh epazote (for example). Thankfully, this isn't really an issue with Irish Beef Stew.

So we'll see how this all plays out and I'll update with pictures once it is finished. This weekend's cooking extravaganza will be Feijoda which are Brazillian Black Beans. That recipe apparently calls for like an entire pig, so I've decided to be contentious and wait until my Vegan girlfriend goes back up to Maine this weekend.