They had stew meat on sale at Costco for $2.49 a pound, so I picked up a 5 pound pack. I also had 3 pounds of a 4-pound pack of kielbasa I hadn't used yet and needed to use within a couple of weeks. I decided to pick up a whole Costco bag of red onions to go with it, and the bag happened to be 8 pounds. So I was using 8 pounds of meat, 8 pounds of onions... why not go with the theme of eights and call it "Crazy 8 Stew"?
8 pounds of meat (5 of stew meat, 3 of kielbasa)
8 pound bag of red onions
8 cups of beef stock
8 ounces dark rum
8 ounces Coca Cola or Coke Zero
8 rounded tablespoons of flour
8 teaspoons of Old Bay seasoning mix
8 tablespoons of spice mix
- 2 parts madras curry powder
- 2 parts ground coriander
- 1 part ground black pepper
- 1 part ground cumin
- 1 part ground smoked paprika
- 1 part celery seed
8 cloves of garlic - crushed
8 slices of thick-sliced bacon
Take all but two of your red onions, cut off the ends, halve them, peel them, and cut them into 1/4-3/8 inch slices. Set aside.
Put the stock, rum, and Coke in your stew pot over low heat and let warm up.
Cut the bacon into small strips and begin sauteeing it in a large skillet over medium heat. Medium heat will help it render out a lot of grease while becoming crispy without burning.
While the bacon sautees (this will take a while), mix the flour and Old Bay seasoning. Take your chunks of stew meat and lightly coat them in the flour, making sure to tap off excess. Save any leftover flour mixture for later. We'll use some to thicken the stew near the end.
When the bacon is crispy, remove it from the pan with a slotted spoon. Reserve most of the drippings in a bowl off to the side, leaving enough to coat the bottom of the pan. Raise the heat to high and when the grease starts smoking, start browning off the floured meat. There's a lot of meat and you don't want to overload the pan, so it will take around 4-5 batches depending on the size of your pan.
As each batch finishes, put it in the stew pot with the hot liquid. After each batch, spoon in enough of the reserved drippings to coat the pan and bring the pan back up to smoking hot before browning the next batch.
When all the meat has been browned, pour the remaining bacon drippings back into the pan and add the onions (all of them). They'll nearly overflow the pan, but as the heat does its magic and softens them, they'll become a lot more manageable.
Toss a bit to spread the bacon drippings around, and cover the pan for 3 minutes. After three minutes, remove the cover, use a pair of tongs to move the onions around (bringing the ones from the bottom up to the top) and cover again. Repeat this process 4-5 times until all the onions have softened. They will release a good amount of liquid which will pick up any good flavors left on the bottom of the pan from the cooking of the meats.
While the onions are cooking down, get out your 8 cloves of garlic, crush them with a garlic press, and add to the stew pot.
Transfer the onions and all the liquid in the pan into the stew pot, bring to a simmer, cover, and let stew for about 3-and-a-quarter hours, stirring periodically.
Around 3 hours into the 3-and-a-quarter, rough chop the remaining two red onions and put aside. Cut your kielbasa lengths in half, then cut half moons about 1/2-5/8 inches thick. Bring out your sautee pan, and begin browning the kielbasa in batches over a medium high heat. As they brown, transfer into the stew pot.
Bring the stew back to a low boil. In the sautee pan where you browned the sausage, you should have about 1-2 tablespoons of rendered grease from browning the sausage. Add enough butter to bring it to about three tablespoons, melt it, and then add three tablespoons of the leftover flour mixture, cooking it into a roux. Add about a cup of the stew broth. Stir the mixture to combine, then pour into the stew pot. Stir well, then cover and let cook for another 20 minutes. Remove from heat and add the diced onion. Stir, cover, and let the residual heat cook the stew for another 30 minutes.
By bringing in the sausage near the end, it stays firm, and the onions added in right after the stew is removed from the heat get a little mellowed by the residual heat, but retain some texture and a little bite (while the sliced onions that stewed for 4 hours are extremely soft and mellow).
Serve sprinkled with some of the crispy bacon (if you haven't nibbled it all while waiting for the stew).
For an experiment, it came out well. It's a hearty stew with good flavor. I might add more vegetables next time (perhaps 8 large carrots and 8 tablespoons of tomato paste), and go with some cream sherry instead of the rum and coke.
It makes 20-25 hearty servings with a lot of meat in them at a cost of about $2 a serving. Add a couple of pieces of good bread, some rice or some pasta, and you can cut down the portion to stretch it even farther while keeping it a comforting stick-to-your-ribs meal.
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