Savory Beef Stew

This is a delicious version of beef stew. It's from allrecipes.com.
INGREDIENTS

* 3 pounds beef stew meat, cut into 1 inch cubes
* 1/3 cup Italian salad dressing
* 2 cups water
* 2 teaspoons beef bouillon granules
* 1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes, undrained
* 1 (10.5 ounce) can condensed beef broth, undiluted
* 1 (8 ounce) can tomato sauce
* 1 garlic clove, minced
* 1 bay leaf
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon dried oregano
* 1/2 teaspoon pepper
* 6 small potatoes, quartered
* 6 medium carrots, cut into 1 inch pieces
* 1 medium green bell pepper, cut into 1/2 inch pieces
* 1 medium onion, chopped
* 3 tablespoons all-purpose flour
* 3 tablespoons cold water



DIRECTIONS

1. In a Dutch oven, brown meat in salad dressing over medium heat. Add the next 10 ingredients; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; cover and simmer for 1-1/2 hours or until meat is tender. Add the potatoes, carrots, green pepper and onion. Cover and simmer for 45 minutes or until vegetables are tender. Combine flour and cold water until smooth; stir into stew. Bring to a boil; cook and stir for 2 minutes or until thickened. Discard bay leaf before serving.

Believe it or not, my first beef-vegetable stew!

That's right, I'd never made beef-vegetable stew on my own before now! I have great taco soup, potato soup, and chicken tortilla soup recipes, and had never gotten around to fiddling with beef-vegetable. But the wind had a bit of a bite to it Tuesday, so I tried my hand at--and it was great! Here's what I did:

1 lb hamburger meat
1 lb frozen corn
2 sm. cans tomato sauce
1 can diced tomatoes (mine were basil and oregano flavored)
3 cups diced potatoes
2 cups frozen green beans
1 packet Lipton onion soup mix

Brown hamburger meat while you bring all the other ingredients to a boil in a soup pot (add water until soup reaches desired consistency). Then add hamburger meat, cover and reduce heat. Simmer for 30mins or so. Meanwhile, bake a pan of cornbread.

YUM!

Rainy Day Baked Potato Soup

Here's a yummy, easy Baked Potato Soup recipe. Diane gave it to me, and she got it from Pat Duncan.

Ingredients:
3 baking potatoes (or five or six red potatoes--my preference)
5 strips of bacon
2 cups chicken broth
1/4 cup instant mashed potatoes (I use the loaded baked potato mix for a little extra flavor)
1 stick butter
1/2 cup flour
3 cups milk
Salt, pepper, Garlic salt
Add-Ins: Cheese, chives

Bake potatoes in microwave or oven. Meanwhile, fry bacon crisp and mix broth and potato mix. Melt butter in large soup pot (while it's melting, cut baked potatoes into chunks) , add flour. Then add milk. Stir frequently so this is a smooth sauce. Add potatoes and broth mixture. Add desired seasonings. Let simmer for 20 minutes or so. Serve it up with cheese on top!

Chicken Tortilla Soup

This recipe is a possible contender for my first-ever Simple & Delicious submission. It's a combination of chicken tortilla soup recipes from All Recipes. Perhaps I should rethink the name though, considering there's no tortilla found in the soup.

Here it is, straight from a wrinkled, broth-spotted piece of yellow legal pad paper:

Ingredients:
1/2 an onion, chopped as fine as you like it (I use my mechanical chopper for a fine cut)
1 t. minced garlic
2 big squirts of lime juice
1/2 jar of salsa
1 can creamed corn
1/2 bag of frozen sweet corn
1 can green chiles
1/2 box chicken broth
1 can cooked chicken OR 2 uncooked chicken breasts, sliced
1 packet fajita seasoning
A couple dashes of cayenne pepper
Tortilla chips, Mexican cheese, sour cream, guacamole

Saute the onion and garlic in lime juice in a big soup pot. When onion is clearish, add the rest of the ingredients, except the fajita seasoning and cayenne. (If you're using cooked chicken, don't add it until you add the seasoning later.) Bring these ingredients to a boil. Reduce heat, simmer until chicken is cooked through. Add fajita seasoning and cayenne, cook a little longer. Serve over corn chips, with Mexican cheese, sour cream, and guacamole as add-ins! (Wal-Mart's Guaca-Salsa is AWESOME)

Delicious meal in a bowl!