Hamburger stew

OK, I'm now getting requests for the recipe for hamburger stew.  Folks, there is no exact recipe; it's SOUP, for heaven's sake.  It's nothing more than vegetable-beef soup, using browned ground beef for the meat.  You can pretty much make it the way you like it.  However, I did an entry a couple of years ago telling how RuthAnn told me to make it; you'll find that entry HERE.  
I won't be making much hamburger stew this winter because I have an abundance of soup bones from the last steer we butchered.  

hamburger stew (or soup)

One autumn when I was working at the local orchard grading apples, one of my co-workers was Ruthanne Odell.  She was a fun person to talk to, and we talked every chance we got.  One day in the course of our conversation, she said, "I think I'll make hamburger stew tonight."
"What?  I've never heard of hamburger stew!"
"You've never made hamburger stew?  I'll bring some in a thermos tomorrow, and you can taste it."
It was very good, and I asked her what was in it and how she fixed it.  
"You brown some hamburger with onion; then you put in enough water for the stew and add carrots and potatoes.  And barley, but not too much, 'cause it's kinda slick-like if you use too much.  Then toward the end, add a little cabbage; I can't use as much as I'd like, 'cause my kids won't eat it if there's too much cabbage.  You can add celery if you got it." 
"No tomatoes?"
"No."  
So I went home and created the first of many batches of hamburger stew.  It's really just vegetable-beef soup, using browned ground beef for the meat.  I experimented and found I wasn't afraid to use more barley.  After several years, I started adding some canned tomatoes, simply because I like to pack all the veggies into a dish as possible.  Vegetables are good for you!  
When available, I also add some okra... not too much, or you WILL have some slick soup.  
Every time I make hamburger stew, I think of Ruthanne, and remember how a simple conversation led to one of our favorite wintertime dishes around here.  
And it amazes me that I still remember that conversation with someone I haven't seen in thirty years.

What do you do with a half-pound of ground beef?

Cliff and I had a cheeseburger Saturday evening when we arrived home from our little trip to Iowa/Illinois. We still have plenty of ground beef from butchering the steer named Meatloaf. Meat lasts a long time around here, because Cliff and I try to eat lots of fruits and vegetables and eat smaller portions of meat. Even more so, now that we have the garden, not to mention the neighbor who gives us plenty of dressed catfish almost weekly.

After making our cheeseburgers, there was a half-pound or so of raw ground beef remaining. We could have had another burger, but we always stop at one these days (albeit a BIG one).

This morning while I pressure-canned some green beans, I browned the ground beef with a diced onion (from the garden) and some celery. Then I added some diced carrots that were about to die an untimely death in the crisper (otherwise known as the "rotter" around here). From the garden I added potatoes, green beans, okra, cabbage, and tomatoes. I tossed in a handful of barley, and dinner is now simmering on the stove.

From such a small amount of hamburger, we now have almost a gallon of soup.

Yes, it's awfully hot and humid outside to be having soup, but the air-conditioning is working nicely here in the house. I feel so very frugal, I could almost squeak.

a small batch of hamburger stew

I made meat loaf yesterday, and was left with perhaps a third of a pound of ground beef. I know, most of you would have incorporated it into the meat loaf, right? But I'm a stickler for using the amounts stated in recipes.

I eyed the meat, wondering if it was enough for two hamburgers. But since I limit our meat portions, that didn't seem like a good idea.

After sleeping on it (not the hamburger, silly; the idea of what to do with it), I decided to make hamburger stew. Thankfully, I do make some things without a recipe.

Trouble is, I'm so used to making a huge pot of stew, and it's hard for me to judge amounts in a smaller batch.

At this point, I realized I should have used one more potato, but it was too late... until I remembered the microwave! I baked a potato in three minutes, peeled it, diced it, and tossed it in. No problem.

I wait until the last ten minutes or so to add the cabbage. Here again, I had to be careful to use the proper amount for such a small batch of stew.

As I added ingredients, it occurred to me how many spices I use that my mother never had in her cabinets, as far as I can remember. Here are just a few of them.

All the above except for lemon pepper and bay leaves are in my stew, which I just sampled. It's good!

When I was a kid growing up, sometimes I'd climb up on a kitchen counter, open the cupboard doors, and sniff all the spices in there, one by one. Mother had a lot of phony Watkins flavorings (coconut, lemon, etc.) that smelled divine. My favorite thing was vanilla; it was so heavenly that I decided one day to taste it.

Bad mistake.

Hamburger Stew

Let's face it, with temperatures hovering near the freezing point, it's time for hearty soups and stews. A local small-town grocery had ground beef for $1.69 a pound; I used a pound-and-a-half of it for hamburger stew. I've blogged about this before, so I won't go into great detail. But it always amazes me how many meals can come from a small amount of ground beef when you use it for stew.

Any form of vegetable stew gives me an opportunity to find veggies in the freezer that need to be used; I just toss them in the mix, and nobody's the wiser. At some time in the past, I thought I had a hankering for Lima beans. After serving some of them with a meal, I realized I wasn't such a big fan of Lima beans and the half-empty bag lay languishing in the freezer. Yesterday, though, they made a great addition to my hamburger stew.



The neighbor who always gives us fish to eat was getting his garden ready for the freeze that's forecast, so Cliff went over there and picked some tomatoes, both green ones and ripe ones. I skinned some of those ripe tomatoes and added them to the stew. Yum! (Cliff came back with more fish, too.)

My daughter's family ate stew with us Saturday. Cliff and I had stew that evening. I fixed something different yesterday at lunch, but we had stew for supper. And there's still a couple of servings left. No, we're not tired of it yet.

Because there's also corn bread left, I asked Cliff what he thought about my getting some cooked beans out of the deep freeze for today. He thought that was a grand idea, until I remembered the bacon I bought at the local grocer's when I got the ground beef... it was "buy one, get one free". And I saw those ripe tomatoes on the table.


So the beans went back into the freezer... they hadn't started to thaw... and so did the corn bread.

We're having BLT's today! And who knows, we might have fried green tomatoes tomorrow.

By the way, I'm learning to Twitter. Haaaaaaa!

Hamburger stew!!!!

Here's a way to make one pound of hamburger feed a multitude. Onion, garlic, and celery cooked tender with the ground beef as it's browned, then carrots, potatoes, a can of tomatoes, as much water as it takes, some chopped cabbage, and barley. Oh yeah, plenty of pepper and maybe some dried parsley and cumin.

I think I'm starving!