Carnivores, Herbivores, & Lamb Stew

This week's theme is dinosaurs, so we have been studying plant eaters, meat eaters, and fossils. Bringing out some of my own rock collection, I showed off a few fossils to M. We then mixed up a simple salt dough (4 parts flour, 1 part salt, 1 part water) and made fossils. She rolled it out on the floor. She then pressed things into it to make "fossils". She used a dinosaur, a branch, and a coffee scoop. I'm not sure what type of coffee scoops lived millions of years ago, but I do try to encourage creativity. We baked the fossils at 350 for about 50 minutes.
Did you know that fossils can burn??
Anyway, the idea was that she would paint it the next day, and section off a dinosaur footprint to make a necklace the day after, but she loves it so much as-is that she is keeping it a decoration in her little kitchen.

The Farmer Joe outfit she is wearing in the pic is leftover from when she was a cotton picker at school in a play earlier this year. It was her choice of what to wear when I said to wear something she could get messy.

The same evening, I decided to have lamb stew. I already had half a bag of lima beans cooked in the fridge that I need to use up before they went bad. I also had an open bottle of red wine lurking around that it seemed noone was going to drink. I looked around on the internet but just couldn't find a recipe that suited me.
So here's mine:

1 onion, sliced
1/4 tsp. fresh rosemary, crushed
1/4 tsp. dried thyme
1/4 tsp. dried basil
3 garlic cloves, smushed
3 tbsp. fermented ginger carrots
3 tbsp. fermented ketchup
3 potatoes, sliced
2 lb. lamb stew meat
1/2 bag of dried lima beans, pre-soaked and cooked
1 cup frozen spinach
3 cups of beef broth
olive oil
sea salt
pepper
1 cup red wine


As you'll note, this recipe could be difficult to duplicate if you don't live in my kitchen, as I have several of the ingredients on-hand from what I've homemade. But you could always substitute.

To start, brown the lamb in a couple tablespoons of olive oil. About halfway through the browning process, add the onions. As they start to become clear, add the wine and the beef broth. Turn the fire down to low. Put a lid on the thing and leave it for about an hour. (You can check on it if you like). Add your smushed garlic and the other herbs. Add some water if you need (I didn't). Put the lid back on and continue to cook for about 30 minutes. Add the potatoes and carrots. Put the lid back on and cook about another 30 minutes. Add remaining ingrediants and continue to cook for about 20 minutes.

I served this up with some homemade garlic bread I made in the breadmaker, using a recipe that came with it. I honestly don't know which was more of a hit.
My husband, however, who is not a huge bread eater, ate 3 pieces of bread.

Coming up: homemade baby food and sloppy joe omelets.