If you’ve read this weeks food issue (I’m sure you have and if not, snap to it), you will have seen recipes from Lisa Schroeder of Mothers Bistro. The ingredients for her creations can all be found at the Ecumenical Ministries of Oregon (EMO) emergency food pantry in Northeast Portland.

I feel I should give more background here, a kind of “behind the scenes,” if you will. The idea for the story was to raise awareness about how the Oregon Food Bank is dealing with in the current economic situation, and parallel that with the increased need for emergency food around our region. Pretty depressing, actually. Then, I was curious how a big name chef might cook using ingredients from an emergency food pantry. That question led me, at first, to Scott Dolich of Park Kitchen.

The idea was this: I’d go to the pantry and do an inventory of the foods they had in stock. Scott would then have to create a menu based on these foods. There were some strange items- Beef knuckles, pig’s feet, odd canned legumes… etc.
Unfortunately, we were unable to run Scott’s menu in the paper, but it can be found on-line here.

During our e-mail exchange, Scott mentioned he had a great recipe for Tripe Stew (tripe being one of the odd ingredients found in a large freezer at EMO’s pantry). I was immediately intrigued and asked if he could send it to me. The recipe arrived in my in-box yesterday afternoon and now I present it to you, dear Blogtown readers. I know that there are some of you brave enough to make this stew. It should be awesome; after all, it was developed by a chef nominated for a James Beard Award.

I’ll try my hand at it as well and let you know how it pans out.

Scott Dolich’s Simple Tripe Stew

2 onions, diced
1 tblspn chopped garlic
“Nob” of butter (not sure how much a “nob” is, but I guess you’ll figure it out – pac)
1 cup red wine
1 can diced tomatoes
1 can chicken stock
Tripe (as much as you want, I guess – pac)
2 cups butter beans

Sauté 2 diced onions with 1 tblspn of chopped garlic in a nob of butter til the onions brown slightly. Add 1 cup of red wine and cook until all of the liquid evaporates. Add 1 can of diced tomatoes and 1 can of chicken stock. Slice the tripe into thin strips and wash thoroughly in cold running water for 5 minutes. Drain the tripe and add all of it to the stew. Simmer over low heat for approximately 1 hour. Add 2 cups of butter beans that have been soaked overnight in water. Continue stewing until the beans are tender, approximately 1 hour. Season heavily with salt and pepper. Serve over rice.