Country Beef, Cabbage & Lentil Stew ❤️ #lentils #comfortfood #beef

Hi everybody, welcome back. It's so nice to be back in my outdoor kitchen cooking for you. I've missed you guys. I hope you have missed me. Today I'll be making a wonderful hearty beef cabbage and lentil stew with all those wonderful ingredients. It's a perfect time of the year for it. Now I'm going to be using this big Dutch oven right here and I've got one pound of ground beef. This is 85-15 ground beef. And I'm going to put it right here in the pot. I'm going to try and leave some of the big chunks there. I like that when I serve a bowl of this. I'm just going to get it nice and brown. I don't like to leave a lot of grease in there. I'm going to leave about one tablespoon of grease in there, so I will be removing the excess. I'm going to be using three large carrots like this. Not too fat in diameter, but they're long. We grow carrots here in the Rio Grande Valley and these carrots are sweet, beautiful. Now I'm going to cut these up, you know, nice bite sized pieces like this. Not real big and not too small because you don't want them to get mushy. Now I think most of you know that we've got a lot going on inside the house with this horrible leak overflow of water that happened up in our attic. Now if you don't know anything about it you can watch the last video that I made so you can see all the mess that we've got inside the house. Everything that had moisture in it has been removed. They have dried everything. It's taken several days. And all this time, my Ron and I are staying in a hotel. But we had to stay in a hotel that was pet friendly because we've got our possum. We've never stayed in a hotel that long, ever, and it's kind of weird, but it's kind of fun at the same time. I don't have to do any dishes, and that's nice. I don't have to do that, so I'm getting a little spoiled. Thank God for insurance. Our adjuster has been very good to us, very fair. Now, I have one green bell pepper right here. It's earthy. It adds a beautiful flavor in your soups or stews, and I'm going to cut it up into nice big pieces like this. I want it to show. See? So after about seven minutes ground beef is ready. I have removed the excess grease. Now I'm going to add my onions. This is one medium onion finely diced. I'm going to add my celery. These are two large celery ribs cut into nice small medium pieces. I'm going to add them in here. Now my green bell pepper and here go the carrots. I'm going to move them around for about seven minutes. I'm going to let all these vegetables release their flavor. That's what we want along Along with a ground beef, just like this. My vegetables are sweating. They are releasing that flavor. That's what we want. Now I'm going to develop the tomato flavor in here. I'm going to make a little well, and I'm going to drop in four garlic cloves, finely minced. It's going to be delicious. And I'm going to add two tablespoons of tomato paste. I want the tomato paste to deepen in color. Just going to move it around for about two minutes. Ooh, the garlic. And the tomato paste are doing their job. Now it's time to build the broth and start the lentils. I'm gonna add seven cups of beef broth. I made this with Better Than Bouillon beef flavor, low sodium. I'm gonna add the seven cups in here. And I'm gonna add three fourths of a cup of lentils. These are the brown lentils. And I have rinsed them really well. And I'm gonna add one teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce. Did I say that right? Worcestershire, I have said Worcestershire. I don't know, but you know what I'm talking about. One teaspoon of garlic powder. I know I added the fresh garlic in there, but the garlic powder can last a lot longer than the fresh garlic. One teaspoon of onion powder. Same thing with the onion powder. And one teaspoon of smoked paprika. I want this to have a beautiful earthy flavor. Half a teaspoon of red pepper flakes. You can leave them out if you don't want any heat. This will not make it really hot, but it'll give it just a little bit of a kick. One-fourth of a teaspoon of ground cumin. Now, I don't want it to go off, you know, Mexican-inspired, and I don't want it to be Italian either. I just want it to be nice and balanced, and I want it to do its own thing. And I've got three-fourths of a teaspoon of dried thyme leaves. Mmm, that's going to be good. Two large bay leaves. Put them in there. Ooh, make sure your bay leaves go down to the bottom. See? Look at this. If you've never tasted lentils before, this would be a good time for you to do it. They're kind of like beans, you know. It adds a good texture to your dish. I'm going to add some pepper. You can add as much as you want. We like a little pepper in there. That's freshly ground black pepper. And I'm going to add some salt. Now that was low sodium, better than bouillon beef flavor. So I'm going to add some salt in here. You can taste it as you go along. I'm going to wait for it to come up to a boil and then I'm going to lower the temperature to a nice low simmer. And I'm going to let it cook like that for about 15 minutes without moving it, just like that. So after 15 minutes, I'm ready to add my tomatoes and potatoes. I have three medium-sized gold potatoes and I cut them up into one-inch cubes. I'm going to add them in here. And I'm going to add one 14.5-ounce can of diced tomatoes, juices and all. I'm going to give them a stir and I'm going to let it simmer gently for 10 minutes, bring it all in together like this. I'm going to replace the lid and I'm going to leave it partially open, just a little bit up here. Let some of that steam, you know, come out. You want to taste it and adjust it. A little more pepper, a little more salt. I think mine is going to be perfect, but this is a good time for you to do it. After 10 minutes, I'm ready to add my cabbage. This is half of a medium-sized cabbage, and I cut the pieces into bite-sized pieces. You don't want big pieces of cabbage, and you don't want it real small either. Otherwise, it just falls apart and gets mushy. So you want them just the right size. I'm gonna add my cabbage in here. Now, it's gonna be real bulky, and you're gonna think, oh my gosh, that's a lot of cabbage. Once it starts to cook, it starts to get nice and soft. And it'll come down in size. I'm also going to add a little fresh thyme in here. I like to add them at the very end because they keep their flavor really nicely like that. Just about three small sprigs like this. I love thyme. Not everybody does but I love thyme. Now if you don't have any thyme you can add a little bit of rosemary and that'll work too. Look at this. Now it's real bulky but don't worry about it because it's going to cook down. It's going to be just perfect at the end. You want to mix it in there really good. Get it down to the bottom but the cabbage is going to release some of its liquid but if you feel like you need to add a little bit more broth you can do that. Very good. Now I'm going to replace the lid and I'm going to leave it at a very low gentle simmer with the lid on. Just like this. Every now and then you want to come in here and gently give it a nice stir and let the 20 minutes go by like that. Now while the cabbage is at a low simmer, I'm going to prepare my garlic butter because I'm going to be making some delicious cheesy garlic bread. I've got four tablespoons of room temperature butter right here and two tablespoons of finely minced garlic cloves and I'm going to add about one tablespoon of finely chopped parsley. That's about a tablespoon right there. I'm going to mix this up really good. Very easy. See how easy it is? And that's good. I'm going to set that aside for just a little bit. I've got an Italian loaf right here. Got this at Walmart. You can use a French loaf if you want to do that. I like them both, so you can use either one. I'm going to slice about four or five slices. We're trying to stay away from too many carbs. I don't want them too thick, but you can just cut them as thick as you want. I think that'll be good. Oh, Just so tempted to pop this into my mouth. Now I'm just going to butter them gently, a little bit on both sides. And I'm going to turn it over and do the same on this side. And then I'm going to put them right here on this small cookie sheet. Now my oven is preheated 375 degrees. I'm going to put it right in the center rack between six to eight minutes or until it's nice and golden. Keep an eye on them. So my bread is nice and toasty. Now I've got some freshly grated Parmesan cheese and freshly grated mozzarella. I'm going to put a little bit of each on top. Oh, the combination is going to be delicious. See, you can make it as cheesy as you want. You can never have too much cheese. See, and now the freshly grated Parmesan cheese right on top. And here it is. Now I'm just going to stick it back into the oven and give it just enough time for the cheese to melt. Very easy. Keep an eye on it. My time is up. I'm gonna turn off the heat. Oh, this looks beautiful. I'm gonna let it cool down for about five minutes while I set up. We're ready to eat. So I have removed the bay leaves. We're ready to serve. Beautiful. I've got a little parmesan cheese right here and I'm gonna put it right on top. And I'm gonna sprinkle a little parsley. Take a look. And my cheesy bread. I like to put it right in there. Oh man. I've been waiting for this all day. I know I say that all the time, but I really have been waiting for this all day. A little bit of everything right here on my spoon. Maybe you're thinking you don't want to add carrots in here, but believe me, they're going to fight for the carrots. Oh man, I can't tell you how delicious this is. The sweet carrots mixed in there with the potatoes and the cabbage. This savory dish was just that pinch of sweetness from the carrots. It's unbelievable. And then the cheesy, crusty bread along with it is out of this world. And you saw how easy it is. Wonderful. So this is my hearty beef, cabbage, and lentil stew. If you like my recipe, give me a thumbs up. Send me a comment and tell me how you prepare yours. If you haven't subscribed, please do. Thank you.