Last weekend I went to collect the other half after he'd been away all week LARPing (if you were wondering, the full Wikipedia explanation of this is here but it's basically grown men and women dressing up in fantasy costumes running about in the woods waving rubber weapons) and the nice lady who'd been doing the catering had 3kgs of diced beef left over from feeding the ravening hordes that needed a home. Being confirmed carnivores, we generously offered to take it off her hands. Then I wondered what the hell to do with it......
Answer? Cook it for ages. And ages. And ages.....
I did actually fry it off in batches first, bit faffy and you can probably skip that if you like, then it went into a couple of casseroles (3 kilos is a LOT, you probably won't need that much, unless you happen to be feeding a tribe of half orcs I guess) with some roughly chopped carrots and onions, a bit of dried thyme and seasoning, and a couple of tins of chopped tomatoes.
Then I just cooked it, on a fairly low heat, for hours. Checked it every now and then and added a bit of water if necessary (a slow cooker would be the best way to do it, if I actually had one) until the meat was lovely and falling-to-bits tender. Then I chopped some butternut squash to go on top, you could use sweet potato or good old spuds instead, and cooked it some more.
It was excellent :-)
Oh and if anyone is wondering what the OH looks like in his LARPing gear, he's the one on the left of this photo wearing the very fetching headband ;-)
