Low Carb Lamb Stew

It is no secret that I am Irish. (Update from 2017: I did a DNA analysis and I'm 44% percent Irish). My last name is both Irish and Scottish. 

When St. Patrick's rolls around I love it. I love the color green.(Update from 2017: I had a green car and I miss that car. That car was on it's last legs and I had literally a week to buy a new car. Now, that a completely new story. I may write up a blog about The Mini Crapper).  
  

Anyway, I received a blog subscription e-mail the other day from: www.recipegirl.com for an Irish Stew Recipe. 

You can find the original recipe at: www.recipegirl.com/2013/03/05/irish-stew/

I liked the idea of Stew because the most popular blog post I have posted so far has been for my Pork Chops Cooked with Golden Mushroom in the Crock Pot. I also LOVED the fact it was an Irish dish. I am kind of intrigued to try to make more Irish dishes. Hey, I should represent my heritage a little. ;-)

I needed to make some obvious modifications since I do not eat potatoes. I thought of the vegetable daikon. It's an Asian radish. I had Google it and found out it did not originate in Japan where I thought it was from. It was originally cultivated in mainland Asia. It is found and used in Japan now though. I found a few recipes using daikon instead of potatoes, so I bought two and am going to try to make another recipe with the one I did not use tonight. 

This is what it looks like: 

image source: commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Daikon.Japan.jpg

I honestly had not tried Daikon until tonight but had a feeling it might be a good substitution for Potatoes in this stew. Luckily my hunch was right on. They were perfect for this stew. I also added more vegetables and modified the spices. So it's not truly an Irish Stew. But that is what I went off when I created this recipe. So this is a HollyG original. 

What it looked like right before I served it for Dinner. 

I know, my pictures are horrible and 

I should start to save up for a new digital camera. 

Ingredients:

• 3 TBS olive oil
• 1 cup baby carrots
• 3/4 cup chopped celery
• 1 small onion, chopped into large pieces
• 1 cup mushrooms, chopped into quarters
• 1 daikon vegetable (**directions on how to cut this up are below)
• 1/2 TSP onion powder
• 1/2 TSP garlic powder
• 1 TSP dried thyme
• 1 TSP black bepper
• 2 TSP salt
• 1 TBS chopped dried chives
• 1 & 1/2 TBS dried parsley
• 2 cups chicken broth or chicken stock or lamb stock (I used chicken broth)
• About 2 pounds lamb meat (I used lamb loin chops, bone in 0.81 pounds & lamb shoulder blade chops, bone in 0.98 pounds). 

Directions:

1. Use a large stock pot on the stove OR you can use a crock pot but the cooking times my vary for the crock pot. Since I used a stock pot, I am not sure of the cooking times for the crock pot. Or if you're really fancy and have a dutch oven, you can use that but I have no idea how to use those (yet). 
2. Add the olive oil, onion powder, garlic powder, dried thyme, black pepper, salt, dried chives and dried parsley to the stock pot. 
3. Turn the burner on high. 
4. Chop the vegetables and add them to the stock pot as you go. This includes the onion, celery, daikon**, carrots and Mushrooms. Put them in that exact order since these vegetables vary in how quickly they cook. (You don't have to chop the carrots since they are baby carrots. You can bypass that step or buy the regular carrots and chop them up yourself.)
5. The vegetables will sweat and soften up as you go. 
6. Add the broth (or liquid of your choosing) to the stock pot.
7. Chop the lamb into large pieces and add it to the stock pot. Do not remove the bones!
8. Cover and cook on medium for 1 hour. 
9. After 1 hour, stir and decrease the temperature to Low. (Mike was luckily off work today and did this for me since I had to work today). 
10. Let it simmer for about 2 hours. When it is done you will notice the meat will fall off the bone. It is important to buy lamb with the bone in, it gives it a nice flavor. It is worth having some bones in it for the flavor. 
11. Once it is done, serve and enjoy! If you do not eat low carb a good thick piece of bread would be great with this to soak up the excess juices. 

**How to chop a Diakon

I found a video how-to when I wrote up this blog after I had made this. But this gives you a general idea how to do it: 

vegetarian-recipes.wonderhowto.com/how-to/slice-oriental-daikon-radish-for-cooking-404254/

I recommend chopping in a certain way for this particular recipe since you are substituting the diakon for potatoes: 

1. Wash the diakon, pat dry with a paper towel. 
2. Peel the outside with a vegetable peeler. 
3. Cut in half lengthwise. 
4. If you see any dirt inside, wash and cut it out if needed. 
5. Chop it up like it's a potato going in Stew. You want it thick, about two to three inches. 
6. Add it to your stew. 

I honestly thought it tasted fairly close to a potato I thought it had the texture of it after it was cooked. I tried a tiny piece before I cooked it and it really did not have much of a taste to it. 

This is really easy to make. It is really all chopping vegetables, throwing it into a large stock pot and letting it cook for a few hours.