Witches Brew Dutch Oven Stew
Bacon, beef, beans, and noodles baked in one cast iron pot over coals. Feeds six.
- calories
- 720
- weight
- 16 oz
- cal / oz
- 45
- protein
- 38 g
- serves
- 6, scales
- prep
- 15 min
- cook
- 60 min
- total time
- 75 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Grab and go
- Needs a cooler
- Basic
Ingredients
| Bacon | 1 lb | chopped before you leave home |
|---|---|---|
| Lean ground beef | 1 lb | |
| Garlic | 2 cloves | chopped |
| Celery | 1 cup | diced |
| Onion | 1 cup | diced |
| Canned tomatoes with juice | 28 oz | do not drain |
| Dark red kidney beans | two 15 oz cans | liquid goes in too |
| Egg noodles | 2 cups | dry, uncooked |
| Canned mushrooms | 10 oz | liquid goes in too |
| Black pepper | 1 tsp | |
| Seasoned salt | 1 tsp | |
| Cayenne | 1 tsp | half this for a mixed crowd |
Method
- Build a fire and burn it down to coals, or start a chimney of briquettes. You want roughly 25 coals ready.
- Set the 12-inch dutch oven over coals and brown the bacon, beef, and garlic together. Break the beef up as it cooks.
- Pour off most of the fat. Leave a spoonful or two behind.
- Add the celery, onion, tomatoes, beans, noodles, and mushrooms. Every can goes in with its liquid — that is the cooking water for the noodles.
- Stir in the pepper, seasoned salt, and cayenne.
- Lid on. Set 8 coals under the oven and 17 on the lid to hold about 350°F. Bake 45 minutes.
- Check at 35 minutes. If the noodles are still firm and the pot looks dry, add a half cup of water and give it another ten.
This is a scout-camp pot meal built around a fact most people fight: canned liquid is free water. Nothing gets drained here. The tomato juice, bean liquid, and mushroom liquid add up to about enough to cook two cups of dry noodles, which means no measuring cup and no second pot. The noodles also thicken the whole thing as their starch comes out, so it finishes as a stew rather than soup with things floating in it.
The bacon fat is the other structural piece. Pour off all of it and the beans and noodles taste flat; leave it all and the top goes greasy. A spoonful or two is the middle. Cayenne at a full teaspoon across six servings is warm, not hot, but cut it in half if you are feeding a mixed group — you can always pass hot sauce, you cannot take it back out.
Packing
Bacon and beef stay in the cooler, frozen if the trip is more than a day. Chop the bacon and dice the celery and onion at home so camp prep is opening cans. Cans, noodles, and the three seasonings pre-measured into one bag ride in the food box.
Variations
- Swap the beef for a pound of smoked sausage, sliced. It is already cooked, so brown it and move on.
- No dutch oven: build it in a deep pot over a grill grate and simmer with the lid on, stirring every few minutes so the noodles do not catch.
https://www.boyscouttrail.com/content/recipe/witches_brew-1750.asp