Irish Stew Weightwatchers Style

Irish Stew Weightwatchers Style

Well now Stew is defintely a staple in any Irish Home, however, nobody that i know makes the same stew, or one as good as your mother's. 

So bearing this in mind, this is how i make mine and its delicious.

This is a winter stew so the potatoes are boiled with the rest of the ingredients so that they thicken the soup.
 
A summer stew in my house is made witht he addition of steak pieces and the potatoes are cooked seperately so that its more of a thin stew.

Some people use oxtail soup to make theirs but in our house we never did.  The most important ingredient within a stew for us is Yorkshire Relish.  We cannot even think about making stew without hearing "Do we have Yorkshire Relish?" Its as important as "Did anyone make sure the emmersion is off?" while going on holidays.

Anyways if anyone is looking for something to make ahead of St. Patrick's Day so that you all have something to tuck into after the parade, this is your man "Paddy".  This, in my opinion actually tastes better the next day, but you can freeze it and reheat and its delicious.  Can also help cure hangovers in my house but not sure if that's been researched enough or medically proven!

So our national day is apon us and im going to dedicate this week to all things Irish but while i was thinking of what to cook today for dinner i realised that everytime i think of stew i reminisce about walking home from school in the lashings of rain.  Getting in the door and peeling off my uniform, while listening to Thin Lizzy with the smell of stew wafting through the house.  Getting into my warm, dry clothes and eating a bowl of stew that felt like my stomach had an electric blanket in it making me all toasting. 

This is the actual song i was thinking of was, Thin Thin Lizzy Dancing in the Moonlight

Serve this with some Farmhouse brown bread to help mop up some of the soup.

Back to the stew

Serves 4

Weightwatchers Pro Points per serving 5

Weightwatchers Pro Points per recipe 20

Ingredients

3 Potatoes, cleaned, peeled and diced

1 Onions, diced,

3 carrots, skin removed and chopped into sticks

1 stick of celery, chopped

1 pack of Superquinn, typically 95% fat free beef mince. there's 356g per pack and still on special at 2 packs for 8 euro.

1 oxo cube

800 mls of boiling water

1 tsp of gravy mix made up with about 2 tbl of boiling water

1 tbl of Yorkshire Relish

Salt & pepper to taste

 2 tsp of dried Parsley

2 tsp of dried Thyme

Directions

Boil 800mls of water

Place mince, onion and celery into a large non stick pot.  Crumble the oxo over the ingreients with the gas on a medium heat.  Stir to help coat the ingredients with the oxo cube.

Add in the potatoes and carrots.  Season with salt & pepper.  Add 1 tsp of parsley and thyme.  Pour in the boiling water. 

Turn up the heat to high and let it all boil and then reduce down to low for about 30 mins but it must be on low and not simmering.   The potatoes should just cook into a soup making it thick.

Add the Yorkshire Relish.  Make up the gravy and with a small sieve like a tea strainer and the gravy and stir and keep on a low heat for about another 5 mins.  Add the remainder of the herbs, stir and serve.




Enjoy the Niptuck way so you dont have too!