Lazy Lamb Stew

My studio apartment in Brooklyn boasts one of the tiniest kitchens known to man.  Cooking a full meal can be a bit of a challenge, with only two burners on an electric stove and an antiquated microwave to work with, and I confess that the thought of the dishes produced by the endeavor that I’ll have to hand wash later can be a real deterrent on days when I’m tired.  I love a good pan-fried steak with scrambled eggs and some garlic-sautéd asparagus – but dang, is it a time-consuming effort.

Enter my saving grace: the crock pot.

While I haven’t yet figured out how to grill a steak in a crock pot (give me time!), I have gotten fairly good at throwing a bunch of other things together to make stews and soups, and last weekend, inspired by the package of lamb stew meat I found at my local organic grocery store, I decided to try something new.  I’ve since found a handful of fancy recipes for lamb stew that sound pretty amazing but have multiple steps (read: lots of dishes) – but if you’re looking for something simple and easy, here’s mine.  (Side note: the crock pot I’m using right now is really tiny – it’s the size most people use for sauces and dips – so you may want to double this recipe for a normal size crock pot.)

Lazy Lamb Stew

Ingredients:

• 1 lb lamb stew meat
• 2 large golden potatoes
• 1/2 purple onion
• 1 tbsp dried thyme
• 1 cup of water

Directions:

1. First, add the stew meat to your crock pot.
2. Wash the potatoes and cut up into large cubes (about 1-2 inches).  (If you’re feeling really lazy, you can also just cut the potatoes in half, and chop them up later, after they’ve cooked.  I might have done that…) Add the potatoes to the crock pot, spread evenly over the stew meat.
3. Peel 1 purple onion and cut in half; store 1/2 for another recipe later, and cut the other 1/2 up into cubes. Add the onion to the crock pot (the cubes will likely fall apart, which is fine – you can just tuck the smaller pieces in between the potatoes).
4. Measure out about 1 tablespoon of thyme and sprinkle over the onion.
5. Then pour 1 cup of water over the thyme, which will help wash most of it down into the lamb and potatoes.
6. Cover and cook on high for 4-5 hours.
7. Enjoy!  (For extra flavor, I highly recommend adding a pat of Irish butter when you serve it up. A glass of red wine is a great complement to this dish as well!)

What I Love About This Recipe:

• It’s soooo easy.  Prep takes literally 10 minutes, and 5 hours later, you have dinner for three (which in my world means leftovers).  Yay!
• Very few dishes!  You can even put the crock pot (after it cools) in the refrigerator to store any leftovers.

Notes:

• As with most stews, switching up the ingredients can make for some fun variety.  Considering adding any of the following ingredients for variations on this recipe:
  • basil
  • carrots
  • leeks
  • roasted garlic
  • celery

What would you add, or do differently?  I’d love to hear about it in the comments.