What does soup mean by culinary rules? Well, the name implies that it’s cooked in one pot, plus it’s usually a mixture of meat, slow-cooked in a hot liquid along with vegetables and legumes. All ingredients should be under the surface of the pot. Another important difference is that stews are different from soups. In the latter, the focus is on the liquid. So today we’ll focus on stews and check out how to prepare the best.
Best meat for stews
Let’s first point out that stews can of course also be cooked without meat and still taste great. However, if you decide on the meat version, it is important which cut you choose from the butcher. Unlike soups, we don’t put bones in stews (except for chicken meat, which will stay juicier if left out). The most welcome parts are those with a lot of collagen, such as beef breast or shoulder, pork shoulder, lamb shoulder… This will turn gelatinous and thicken the sauce during the cooking process. These cuts of meat are usually firmer, but soften when cooked slowly.
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pot selection
Believe it or not, the choice of fate has a huge impact on the end result. It is better to choose cast iron, since the soup thickens much more. In addition, their advantage is that you can choose between preparing soup on the stove or in the oven.
Patience is worth its weight in gold
If you need to remember just one thing about making stews, this should be the rule of patience. A good soup can never be cooked quickly, all culinary lovers in the world agree. Of course, you can use various shortcuts, such as using an economy pot or any other similar device. But in the end, in terms of taste and texture, soups cooked longer will always win.
We don’t have to host them exactly
Because we want our stews to be dense, we can host them in a variety of ways. Some do it the French way, by frying the flour in fat. Alternatively, you can use tomato paste, legumes or potatoes. Prolonged cooking will extract the starch from these ingredients and thus thicken the sauce. And of course we repeat the advice above again. Use cuts of meat that have a lot of collagen.
Read more: You must do this before you put vegetables in the oven
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