Meatless Monday – Vegetable Stew

One of my very favorite meals when it starts to get chilly outside is stew.  Finding a recipe for vegetable stew that had a creamy base similar to those with meat in them was a big challenge, but a must for me. I decided to see what I could throw together on my own and came up with this recipe.  It’s super easy and my husband (who is a huge meat lover) called it a football Sunday meal, which is a really big deal because if you watch sports you know that the food you eat while watching is pretty important.

Here’s what you need:

• Olive oil
• 1 large yellow onion, chopped
• 3 ribs celery, chopped
• 5-6 medium carrots, chopped
• 10 small potatoes (the ones I had were small so you could adjust the number according to the size of the potatoes that you have available)
• 1 can Eden Organic cannellini (white kidney) beans, drained and rinsed
• 2 cloves garlic, minced (use more or less depending on you taste for garlic)
• 3-4 bay leaves
• 1/4 cup fresh parsley, chopped
• fresh thyme (dried is fine if you don’t have any fresh)
• salt
• pepper
• 1 packet of vegetarian brown gravy
• 4 cups of vegetable broth or stock
• flour

Here’s what you need to do:

1. In a large pot heat olive oil (about 3-4 tablespoons) on medium then add chopped onion, stirring occasionally.
2. After about 5 minutes add the celery and carrots.  Continue to cook until slightly softened.
3. Add the vegetable broth and the potatoes, salt and pepper to taste.
4. Prepare the brown gravy according to the package directions – immediately stir into the vegetable mixture
5. Add the minced garlic, parsley, and thyme – more salt and pepper if desired.
6. Stir and bring mixture to a gentle boil.  Once boiling stir and continue to boil for a couple of minutes.
7. Reduce heat to a simmer and add the white beans.

If you would like a thicker and more creamy base, you can prepare a basic gravy with flour and water then slowly stir it into the stew.  I just took 1-2 tablespoons of flour and 1-2 cups of cold water and stirred constantly until boiling.  Once it’s at a boil continue to stir and boil for about a minute.  Gradually stir into the stew mixture.  It should thicken as it simmers.
Allow the stew to simmer for about 30 minutes and taste, taste, taste.  This amount easily fed my family of 4.  And in case you forgot, I’m the only girl with a hubby, a teen, and a pre-teen.  They have big appetites and gobbled up this stew.  I also served some popovers on the side, which were really easy to prepare and yummy for dipping in the stew.