by guest blogger, Arielle Narva
There is something about soup. It comforts, fills, satisfies. It’s better the next day! –as I was always reminded growing up. And it allowed me, a few weekends ago, to make use of the mushy carrots I’d forgotten (and that REALLY felt like fingers in my hands) combined with roasted apples, ginger and sweet potatoes. My 19-year-old brother, a true chef, was visiting and took the reins while I sat on the wobbly wooden chair I’d transplanted from our childhood kitchen. He caramelized onions with raw honey and garlic while sharing catering war-stories, reminding me yet again of his age-less wisdom, his ability to see and speak the barest truths, his authority.
But this isn’t about that soup. It’s about stew. That dreary Saturday and first use of our grandmother’s big old stew pot left me excited about what I’d do next. How else I could make my new home, and specifically new kitchen, my own, and warm, and familiar. I started thinking about stew, and about beef, which I rarely eat and never, ever buy. On Tuesday I went to the farmer’s market near Borough Hall and bought organic stew beef. My mother was coming to visit.
The thing about stew that appealed to me most was cooking it all day long, as long as I wanted, as long as I could bear. I was thinking of Caldosa, which is more than anything, tradition. In Cuba, for every celebrated event, birthday, wedding, excuse needed, Caldosa, a huge combination of meats, vegetables and secret spices is made. It is not just a meal, it’s a day-long party, with strictly maintained stages and music and rum, beginning in the morning. It is the universal family dish, the coveted personal twist, and was seen as a true abomination to my boyfriend’s family that I, an American, secretly-non-pig-eating woman, had never tasted it. So that became the reason for my first. A Caldosa, and therefore enormous party, to celebrate my first Caldosa.
The problem was that Nieves, Juan Carlos’ mother, wouldn’t let me near the stove. Nieves means snow, a beautiful, yet confusing name in a place that hardly requires sleeves, but fits her perfectly. I’d spent the summer observing, discovering, warming up to this wise, strong, badass chiiiiiilly woman, but it didn’t matter. There was no fucking way we’d be cooking side-by-side, chummy pals at the burner. I understood, of course, and stuck to potato peeling and garlic dicing out back with the chickens. After the sun had fallen and we had already danced, forgotten our hunger, and returned to the kitchen several times, I was handed a mug, the first one, of the steaming hot, 2nd wind stew. It was rehabilitative like the strongest coffee, but with the powers of true nourishment, the sense of a deliberate and experienced matriarch, and the tastes and choices of her Afro-Cuban family histories. The ones she’d never share with me, not yet.
So, I wanted to make stew. My heartache craved that stew. But it is not something you ask for, or look for, or replicate. It’s something you create from memories, from your own grandmother’s recipe matched against your father’s suggestions, and then make your own, in your very first kitchen.
Nana Narva’s Beef Stew
- 3 lbs stew beef/chuck in small pieces
- olive oil for browning
- 1 medium onion, sliced coarsely
- 1 head of garlic
- 3 or 4 stalks of celery
- 8 or 9 carrots
- 3 white potatoes
- 3 sweet potatoes
- 1 container dried apricots and/or dates, raisins, white raisins
- salt, pepper, cinnamon
Brown meat in oil, slowly for about 20 minutes (important for dark gravy). Add onion for last few minutes of browning. Cover with boiling water, scraping loose bottom of pan. Add celery cut into 1-inch pieces. Cook until meat is fork-tender (about one hour) covered. Season the stew. Add carrots and cook for ½ hour. Add potatoes and cook until tender, about 45 minutes. Correct sweet&savory seasonings to your taste. Let it sit. And sit. And stay there.
