Blogtember Day 23: A Family Recipe - Scottish Stovies Rosie Style!

Hi Honeys
Back again for day 23 of the Blogtember Challenge, the fun, yearly link up organized and run by Bailey Jean of Brave Love Blog.  We're in the last week!  It's been such fun this year, as always x

Today's prompt: Share a family recipe  

Have you ever heard of "stovies" honeys?  It's a one pot, use whatever you have, kind of hot pot or stew that was a dinner staple when I was growing up.  It was the first meal I cooked in our first, tiny flat for Hubby after we got married.  I would imagine that most Scots women over a certain age will know what stovies is, will have cooked it countless times, probably learned how to cook it from her mother, who will have learned from her mother and so on.

Thing is though, even though most Scots will know (and love) stovies, if you were to ask thirty Scots for their stovies recipe, you'd more than likely be given thirty entirely different recipes :) I'll share with you my recipe then, originally learned from watching my beloved Gramma as a child and adapted into my own method over the last thirty years or so :)

This is a recipe that costs very little to make, uses up leftovers if you have any (replace the sausages with whatever you do have leftover) and makes a warming and filling family meal for a chilly evening.

Rosie's Scottish Stovies   

Ingredients

1 pack of skinless sausages (or steam them, allow to cool and then remove the skins honeys)

a little oil (I used a few drops of olive oil)

1 large onion

Whichever vegetables you have on hand:
today I used:
2 large carrots
a chopped Leek
1/2 Turnip
3-4 large potatoes
2 stock cubes (I used couple of oxo but whatever you have honeys)

Directions:

1. In a large stew/soup pot add a few drops of oil to the bottom and put on a low heat.  For stovies in our house I'd be opening a pack of "Wee Willie Winkies" (small sausages and a brand most Scots, of a certain age, will smile when they hear it mentioned) as my Gramma did when I was young, but I asked Hubby to buy me some when he was out yesterday and he brought me back a pack of Richmonds instead. bless him :) At least they're skinless.

If you're using sausages too honeys and they do have skins, just steam them for around 15 minutes, allow to cool, then carefully remove the skins.  Alternatively, have a look in the fridge and see what's there.  In place of the sausages, leftover beef or chicken is fine too.  It's up to you and it's all good :) 

Chatting to a dear friend yesterday (hello Alex x) she told me her stovies was always made of whatever meat was left over from Sunday dinner, could be lamb or beef.  Alex lives on the East coast of Scotland and I'm a West coast lassie, is this the difference?  As I said most Scots women will have a Stovies recipe, most learned from watching their Mum or Gramma.  It just happens that my Grammy used mini sausages because we all loved them so much 💖 

2. Back to our large pot with the wee drop of oil, just enough to stop the sausages sticking to the base of the pot.  When the oil is warm, add your meat, in my case larger sausages (not my usual mini ones -tsk... send a man..... 😊 cut down to smaller bite size pieces. 

3.  Using a wooden spoon keep turning them until lightly browned...

     

4. Once the sausages are browned, add around two pints of stock. I made mine using two (oxo) stock cubes but again, whatever stock cubes you have are fine.  Allow to simmer over a medium heat while you wash and chop vegetables.  I've written in the ingredients what I used but just use whatever you have in kitchen honeys, that's the fun bit :)

5. Add chopped vegetables to your pot, stir and allow to continue to simmer over a medium heat while you peel and roughly chop potatoes.

6. Add potatoes to your pot, stir through, put your pot lid on (will cook faster & saves energy) and continue to allow to simmer over a low-medium heat until potatoes are cooked (soft) all the way through - this should take approximately 18-20 minutes. Top up your stock if you have to by adding a little boiled water (doesn't reduce heat in the pot the way cold water would.)

7. Once potatoes are cooked through, switch off heat.  Now years ago I would have thickened the stock using cornflour (mixing equal parts cornflour & cold water until no lumps, then adding a little of the warm stock to the corn flour until mixed, then adding this cornflour & stock mix through the stew, stirring until combined and while it thickens) or some Bisto powder -blast from the past!  Does anyone else remember making gravy using Bisto powder?

Nowadays though, we all usually have a tub of gravy granules in the cupboard, so stir these through to thicken your stock into a gravy and....

8. Serve while hot, if you'd like to you could add a side of buttered, thickly sliced, crusty bread.  Enjoy while awaiting compliments from your nearest and dearest 💗

This was our dinner last night honeys and it was absolutely delicious! Hubby came in from the back garden, where he'd been working on the back fence (he's been taking it apart and re-building all this week bless him) and first thing he said was "dinner smells great honey" 💖

I can't wait to see everyone's recipes today! I love recipes! I love finding new recipes to try out, I'm off to look! You can too dear ones, you'll find the link up, and everyone's recipes, here x

Till tomorrow honeys, smile lots and hug even more, huggles xx