Hearty But Easy Beef Stew

Make this tasty, rich beef stew for a meal that will warm you on a cold winter day!

My mother, Shirley Fried, loved this recipe.  She got it from her best friend, Adele Hochheiser.  Adele was a wonderful Jewish cook.  As a child, I loved going over to Adele’s house because of all the delicious food preparations and food goings on there.  I especially loved being there for one of her Friday night (Shabbat) dinners.  The smells in her house were intoxicating.  One of my vivid childhood memories is going over for dinner to the Hochheiser’s on the Jewish holiday of Sukkoth.  We ate dinner in the beautifully decorated succah at least 3 times during my childhood.  What a treat!  Those dinners in the succah were so delicious.  The whole experience of eating dinner with the Hochheiser family, with Al and Adele and their three girls, Gail, Rhonda, and Nancy was wonderful.  The dinner I remember best is when Adele made duck with a cherry sauce. It was elegant and delicious.  Now, getting back to this stew recipe, I really have not changed Adele’s original stew recipe at all.  My ex-husband, Joe Kahn loved this stew, but my mother loved it the most.  I have made this stew for my mother often.  She freezes it and eats it for much loved meals during the winter.  My mother likes to eat it over brown rice.

• 2-3 pounds chuck stew meat
• 2-3 cans Condensed Rokeach Mushroom and Barley Soup
• 2-3 small 8 oz. cans tomato sauce
• 1 large onion, peeled (whole)
• kosher salt
• pepper
• corn or light olive oil

Put a little corn oil or light olive oil in the bottom of a large pot.  Put the stew meat in pot, and season the meat with salt and pepper.  Brown the meat.  Pour off any fat, or drain the beef in a colander and then return to the pot.  Add the soup and the tomato sauce.  Peel the onion, pierce it with the prongs of a fork to allow the juices to flow out of it as it cooks, and add it to the pot.  Add a little water, so that the meat is almost covered with liquid.  Bring to a simmer over a medium flame, and then cover the pot.  Cook about 2 1/2 to 3 hours over a very low flame or until the meat is very tender.  Season to taste with additional pepper.

Note:  You don’t need to go too heavy on the salt, because the salt content in the soup is very high already.