Pop-Pop’s lamb stew

Ingredients:
1 pound of lamb stew meat.
1 large Vidalia onion
3 tsp’s minced garlic
1 pint beef broth (3 small cans)
1 can tomatoes (6 in 1 best choice or diced from local store)
1/2 cup red wine
Seasoning: Salt (1 tsp), pepper (1tsp), marjoram (1tsp), and parsley (a handful of fresh or 3 tbsp of dry)
Vegetables: cut to bite size (this is especially important with the rutabaga as it will give considerably more flavor) – cut to bite size
1 cup each – celery, carrots, parsnips, rutabaga

Directions:
Preheat oven to 450°
Add to the pot: chopped vidalia onion and garlic – saute until the onion is transparent.
Add: beef broth, tomatoes, and wine and then the lamb stew meat.
Add seasoning
Bake covered for 1 hour.
Add vegetables
Bake additional 45 to 60 minutes
Vegetables should now be tender. It may require additional oven time depending upon your oven.
Serve and enjoy. This is definitely one of my all time favorites. It tastes best with lamb stew meat, but you can also use beef stew meat cut up at your local grocery store as a cheaper replacement for the lamb meat. When Pop-pop’s lamb stew is being cooked the smell in the house from this is intoxicating and everyone will want to try it before it is done cooking. Just try it and see for yourself. This will probably be one of your favorite dishes.

No, this is not a recipe.  From time to time, I will provide tips and ideas that I think are beneficial to anyone that is interested in cooking in any capacity from the beginner to the most expert chef.  And one thing I’ve found that a lot of people sometimes have a problem with is getting the perfect boiled egg.  It sounds easy does put the egg in water and boil on the stove and then let it cool and crack the eggs, remove the shell and either eat them or use them to make egg salad or some other dish.  

The EggGenie

The problem is how long any of what temperature do you cook them for the perfect boiled egg?  And what if you prefer a medium or soft boiled egg versus a hard boiled egg?  Then you have to keep in mind everyone’s range and oven are a little bit different.  They all vary to some extent.  Some run hotter.  Some run cooler and some have hot spots.  This can make it so that what would be on one oven a hard-boiled egg would, on another one, be a totally different soft boiled egg.  And if you know the difference between a hard-boiled egg and a softball and obviously one is harder and the other one comes out and the yolk breaks just like a liquid. 

Well, rather than trying to figure out the different ranges, temperatures and boiling times there is a much easier way.  And no I am not getting paid or endorsed here. I just happened to go to my local Ross’s department store and see some interesting items in the kitchen and culinary department.  One of these happened to be the EggGenie.  It was on sale for $4.99 and it might tip for today is if you want to have perfect Stated on the box that this was seen in TV infomercials.  I think I vaguely remember having seen it years ago on TV.  The idea looked simple and I figured it was worth a try.   

Here the EggGenie is steaming some soft boiled eggs.

So I brought the EggGenie home and we gave it a try.  It was far easier than cooking boiled eggs on the stove and interestingly it came with this little plastic shot glass that was measured for 1 to 7 eggs and had markings for soft medium and hard boiled.  This made it foolproof to get the exact boiled eggs that you desire.  Basically, the way it works is you fill in the aluminum pan inside it with the water from the plastic shot glass and this water will then turn into steam and cook the eggs.  The unit turns off when all of the water has turned into steam and there’s none left.  So obviously there is a lot less water used for a soft-boiled egg than for a medium or a hard-boiled egg.

The buzzer just went off and the eggs are now done.

Once the buzzer goes off you just remove the eggs and place them in cool water.  Then they are ready to be used for whatever dish you were going to use the boiled eggs for.  You can also just peel them and eat them yourself as is.  My favorite is the soft boiled eggs and they are just so perfectly done with this contraption.   So, my tip for today is if you want to have perfect soft, medium or hard-boiled eggs then you need to go and pick up one of these things at your local Ross’s department store (thesesame items are often times also carried by their sister stores T.J. Maxx and Marshall’s).  For five dollars you won’t find a better egg maker.

A close up of the finished soft boiled eggs in the EggGenie.