Need an easy comfort food recipe? Here it is!

Last weekend, I made dinner for my parents. I haven't made this dish in a long time and had never made it for them before.

 

Hamburger Stroganoff.

 

It is extremely easy, nothing fancy, but one of my favorite comfort food recipes.

 

Cook 1 lb of ground beef (I prefer 95/5 or 90/10)

 

 

Sautee a box of sliced mushrooms (cut up smaller if you so desire), half of a small onion chopped, garlic and three tablespoons of butter.

 

 

 

 

When both are done, combine the mushroom mixture into the ground beef skillet. Add black pepper and two tablespoons of flour.  Add a can of Cream of Mushroom soup and cook uncovered for 10 minutes.

Meanwhile, boil water for pasta. I like to use whole wheat or whole grain angel hair pasta.

Once it is at a roaring boil, cook the pasta for four minutes. Drain in a colander.

Add 12-15 oz. of fat free sour cream to the ground beef mixture and let simmer for 10 minutes uncovered. If you haven't already opened up a bottle of wine, now would be the time do so. I tend to enjoy drinking wine while I cook as is evidenced by the photo below.

 

When done, serve the stroganoff over pasta in a pasta bowl and enjoy! I also like to heat up a few slices of French or Italian bread.  Everything is better with bread!

 

I tend to like a light red wine with hamburger stroganoff. Dad had a 2009 Sticky Beak Syrah on hand so we opened it and it went rather well with the stroganoff. It didn't blow me away but no Syrah has ever blown me away.  It had a faint aroma of spice and nutmeg with a taste of cloves, plum, black pepper and spice.

After dinner, we decided to have a chocolate taste test. We tried the wine with a Ghiradelli dark chocolate and sea salt caramel square which made the wine smoother. The Ghiradelli milk chocolate with sea salt and roasted almonds square showed no promise. It didn't change the taste of the wine one bit. However, the wine definitely showed improvement with a slice of  four layer devils food cake with chocolate icing!

 Shocker!

As I've said before and will say over and over, I am not an expert and I enjoy trying new wines and pairing the wines with food. Sometimes it works wonderfully, sometimes it doesn't do much at all.  No big loss because this was a Syrah and I can take or leave Syrahs.