The Craftiest Workshop

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! We had Thanksgiving dinner yesterday with Chris’s brother’s family. The usual turkey with all the fixings although the turkey was done on the smoker this year. I have felt very full all day today like I am still in a turkey coma. The meal was great but the highlight meal of my week was this stew!

I saw a recipe for beef stew that I wanted to make that had apple cider in it. At Costco last week, 4 lbs of stewing beef was over $50. I could not make myself spend that much on it. I sidled over to the pork section instead and found a tray of 10 thick pork loin chops for only $17. I decided to change the recipe a bit to make it a pork stew instead. It is usually pork that is paired with apple anyhow, not beef…isn’t it?

The other reason for making the stew was that it asked for carrots, potatoes, celery and onions. I have the carrots, potatoes and onions all recently pulled from my garden plus some celery that a friend gave me from her garden. For the apple cider, I used a jar of the spiced apple juice that I made last fall.

Apple Cider Pork Stew

Ingredients

2 Tbsp olive oil
2 lbs of pork meat cubed (I used two pork loin chops)

3 cups apple juice or cider

1 2/3 cups chicken broth

2 Tbsp apple cider vinegar

1.5 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

1 tsp dried thyme

3 med potatoes cut in 1/2 cubes

4 med carrots sliced (I used about 2 cups of tiny carrots from my garden)

3 celery stalks diced

2 med onions cut in small wedges

1/4 cup water

1/4 cup flour

Directions

Brown pork in large pot. Add apple cider, broth, vinegar, salt, pepper and thyme. Bring to a boil, cover and simmer 1 hour on low heat.

Add the vegetables, bring to a boil again. Cover and simmer on low for 30 minutes.

Whisk the flour into the cold water. Once smooth, add it to the stew and stir. Bring to a boil again until thickened.

Serve on its own or with some thick bread.

This was the leftovers after we had it for one meal. It would feed four or five I would say.

I had some for lunch yesterday and will have some more for supper today. I just love the flavour of the sauce/gravy. It seemed to soak right into the carrots and potatoes giving them the sweet flavour as well. It was a wonderful fall meal for a cooler fall day.