A cow, a tree, and a cooker

We are now in possession of one sixth of a cow.
Local, grass fed, hormone & junk free.
And all nicely packaged, labeled, & frozen filling our chest freezer in the garage.
Picking up the cow last week was an adventure.  It's a LOT of beef.  Cuts I am not even sure what to do with yet....time to brush up on some new cooking tricks.

Yesterday we picked up our Christmas tree.
Two years ago we had a most unfortunate incident with aphids and our Christmas tree ( see O Tannenbaum) and I have been a tad gun shy of another real tree.
Last year we went ahead with a real one and I was paranoid every day the tree was in the house.
The OCD was out in full force, checking the base of the tree daily for any signs of bugs or movement.
This year I was on the fence on real vs. fake, and then I heard of stink bugs in a friends tree...
And now we have a fake tree.
Bug free.
And so far, the peace of mind far outweighs the scent of evergreen in the air.

Today I decided to cook some of our cow.
Found a yummy recipe for braised beef stew and dusted off my slow cooker.
Got everything assembled, turned on the cooker & went along my merry way.
Then about 4:30 decided to check on dinner.
It should have been simmering for about two hours....but it wasn't.
It was warm.
With crunchy potato, and carrots.  Yum.
So I channeled my inner "Top Chef", tossed the whole thing in a stew pot, and plopped it on the stove.
And it finally did simmer, and was quite yummy, but now I need a new slow cooker.
One that isn't quite as slow as mine, if you know what I mean.

Got a lotta cow to get cooked.