Beef Short Ribs Supreme

Most of you know that I love to cook but lately it has become a drudge. Probably cause the outside temps have been above 100 and the last thing you want to do is heat up the kitchen. Most of the time it's coming up with a recipe to cook. If you're like me I cook the same 10 recipes over and over. Boring. A few years back a friend of mine, Susan, shared a short rib dish that her husband made. It was memorable. The local grocery store had short ribs on sale and it prompted me to recall the recipe she had given me. I bought the ribs and proceeded to look for the recipe. Well I couldn't find it. I called her and she gave me a new photo copy of the recipe. The recipe comes from "Favorite Recipes from Friends", (Mary Stoddard)The Town Hill School; Lakeville, Connecticut.
So here's the recipe. It's really good and it's going to be a new favorite of mine. If you make it let me know how you like it. During the last 1/2 hour of cooking I added some water to make it a little more saucy. I served it with mashed potatoes and a salad. Hope you like it.

Beef Short Ribs Supreme

Ingredients:
3-4 pounds beef short ribs
2 Tbls. vegetable oil
4 stalks celery, chopped
3 medium carrots, scraped and chopped
1 (6oz.) can tomato paste
½ c. firmly packed brown sugar
½ c. chopped onion
½ c. water
½ c. red wine vinegar
2 Tbls. Dijon mustard
2 tsp. salt
1 clove garlic, minced
1 bay leaf

Directions:
Brown short ribs on all sides in hot oil in a Dutch oven.
Cover and bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour.
Drain; return meat to Dutch oven.
Add celery and carrot.
Combine tomato paste and remaining ingredients; stir well.
Pour sauce over meat and vegetables in Dutch oven; cover and bake 1 ½ hours or until meat and vegetables are tender.
Remove and discard bay leaf.

Yield: 4 to 6 servings.

Deb's Portugal Trip November 2008

Here are a few pictures of my trip to Portugal in November of last year. A few cities did not get published because I was having issues with my camera battery. Hopefully I'll update the blanks when my friends share their pics with me. If you want to get a map of Portugal out you can get an idea of our travels. Our Trip started in Lisbon. We stayed for 2 nights. The trip started off with me not having luggage for 3 days. Thankfully when my travelmate got her luggage she shared some of her clothes with me. To sum up our trip it was quite eventful. Lost luggage, a side trip down a runaway truck ramp. Couldn't find our hotel because our directions were screwed up. The Hotel was 120km in the wrong direction. Several road trips asking for directions and oh, Marta broke her tooth and ended up using sealing wax to fill the gap. Darla fell down what she thought was a ramp but there was a small step there that she didn't see. She screwed up her knee pretty bad. Thankfully we didn't have to go to the hospital but it made slow going for her. All in all the Portuguese people were jems. They don't look to friendly but they are the nicest people on the planet once you ask the first question. They will also go out of their way to help you out. From Lisbon we went to Sintra,Alcobaca,Obidos,Nazare,Coimbra,Conimbriga,Braga,Bucaco,Luso,Aveiro,Oporto,
Amarante,Pinhao,Sao Joao de Pesqueria,Penedono to Viseu,back through Coimbra then down to Tomar,Baleal,Peniche,Lourinha,Torres Vedras then back to Lisbon. We saw quite a bit on this trip and God surely had us under his wing. By the end of the trip I could manage enough Portuguese to eat, buy stuff and get us going in the right direction.
I hope you enjoy the pictures. Maybe it will encourage you to go on your own trip.