Stews/8 recipes

Use the slow-cooker and liquid smoke instead of grilling and wood chips. The result is outstanding, and the pork is packed with flavor.

A cozy and comfy miso stew is ideal for cool fall and cold winter. Sweet potato, tofu (or you can use cooked chicken or pork meat instead), and mushrooms are browned with garlic, ginger and scallions first to maximize the deliciousness, then simmered in a miso based soup. Warms you up in a second!

A hearty beef stew served over mashed potatoes - a cold weather delight!

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It's the season of Swiss chard and kale. We got lots of these fresh leafy greens from our CSA farm, and I was trying to come out an idea to use them up, surfing the internet, found a recipe in New York Times, it's a chard and feta phyllo tart. Definitely got the inspiration, I used both chard and kale, instead of feta, I used cheddar; and I sauteed some fresh mushrooms and added some toasted pine nuts, which worked very well. Also, I used a pie plate instead of a tart pan, and it was a great success, absolutely flavorful and delicious. The phyllo crust came out flaky and crispy. Have definitely become one of my signature recipes :)

Last summer, we had some fresh tomatillo from our farmer's share, then we found this recipe and gave it a try. The flavor was so good, we followed the recipe exactly, but you don't like too spicy, you can reduce the amount of the green chilis. The result will be still outstanding! It can be served warm or chilled.

Make your pasta dishes seem authentic with this spaghetti sauce made of Italian sausage, tomatoes and a variety of spices.

These cherry cream cheese bars were divine. The cream cheese added the rich creaminess; I made my own cherry pie filling, which was packed with cherry flavour and not super sweet, also did a few changes to make these bars healthier (see the linked recipe below) but still decadent.

Cheesy, creamy and tasty.

This prosciutto, fontina and sun-dried tomato tart was brilliant. The combination of these three ingredients and the buttery-crispy puff pastry was absolutely delicious!

From across Northern Italy there are many variations. A rich broth, juicy Italian tomatoes and rich herb simmered for a long time. I used a mixture of sliced mushrooms from my local supermarket and dried lobster, oyster and shitake mushrooms. Then used the mushroom juice in place of chicken broth. Outstanding reduction of rich comfort flavors.

This is the best lassagna I have ever tried, basil-pesto definitely gave the whole lasagna tons of tasty flavor, also used low-fat milk and cheese, reduced the amount of fat, but the sauce was still creamy, asparagus was tender-crispy between the layered creamy stuffed noodles.

A hearty and warm choice for those cold winter nights.

Something about bacon goes so well with spinach. Using a hot bacon dressing wilts the spinach just the perfect amount, not rubbery and not too mushy and packed with flavor.