Winter Warmer Veggie Stew

I've always felt that stew gets a bad rep. This dinner is cheap, nourishing and tasty as hell. What's not to love?

This dinner is perfect when you want to stretch your pennies but refuse to compromise on taste. Also it gets as complicated as 'chop and add to a pan'. Anyone can make a fantastic stew and this recipe will sort you out.

Get your eight a day in one meal!

I bought a stew pack from Aldi recently, which set me back around £1.70 and will be the base for 8 meals. You can buy a version of this pack from most supermarkets but the aldi one cames with an extreme amount of carrots. These will be put towards my spiced carrot and lentil soup and so nothing goes to waste.

I reckon someone in the aldi purchasing department had a crush on a carrot farmer

I also used a couple of tins that I had in my cupboard and added in a pack of mushrooms to mix up the texture, but you can put whatever you like in. Prefer peppers? Chickpeas? Leeks? Whatever you like, this is a recipe open to suggestions.

A stew is not the most culinary challenging of dinners: just keep adding adding, stirring and simmering until all the components are tender to the bite.

This is a great dinner to look forward to after a long days work with a nice crusty bread roll. Don't forget to mop up that tasty juice at the end too!

RECIPE

Ingredients:
A selection of root vegetables: I used a small swede, 2 parsnips and 4 carrots
2 onions
1 stick of celery
1 tin of chopped tomatoes
1 tin of beans (I used butter beans but kidney or Cannellini beans would also be fantastic)
300g mushrooms
1 tbsp tomato puree
1 tbsp minced garlic (around 3 cloves)
1 tsp chilli flakes
1 tsp mustard
1 litre of vegetable stock

Method:
Begin by dicing all your root veg and slicing the onion and celery. This is the most time consuming part of the whole recipe but can be quite therapeutic!
Saute the onions, garlic, celery and chillis for around 5 minutes, or until they are soft.
Tip in the root vegetables and sweat for another 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Add in the beans, tinned tomatoes, puree and mustard and cook for around, shockingly, 5 minutes.
Pour in the stock and mushrooms, pop the lid on and do something fun for 20 minutes while this simmers away. I recommend trying to do a handstand against the wall.
Once your veggies are all tender to the bite it's time to up the flavour: what does it need? I decided it needed a dash of balsamic vinegar, a splash of soy sauce and a sprinkling of seeds for protein.

When you're happy with the flavour it's time to toast some bread rolls and ladle this bad boy out. This also works really well as freezer food for when the days are long but you still want something homemade and delicious.

What did you add to your stew? Let me know!