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With the cooler weather here and leaves starting to fall off the trees – it’s all about the comfort food! Our Autumn Pork Stew is the perfect thing to serve on a cool Fall evening!
This delicious stew also takes advantage of fresh produce found at the supermarket this time of the year – like apples, butternut squash, carrots and potatoes. And, what makes this stew a little different from others is that it is thickened by using apples and apple sauce in the broth, rather than a roux made from butter and flour.
Chunks of pork are seared until golden brown along with bacon, onions and garlic – then cooked with carrots, apples, apple sauce and chicken stock for two hours on the stovetop until the meat is super tender. Then the Autumn Pork Stew is finished by adding in chunks of butternut squash and new red potatoes.
The pork, apples and fall vegetables are a perfect flavor pairing. This wonderful Autumn Pork Stew is comfort food at its best!
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Autumn Pork Stew
Note: The apples disintegrate into the stew so don’t worry how you cut them.
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon olive oil
- 1/2 pound thick cut bacon, diced
- 2 cups onion, diced
- 1 1/2 tablespoons fresh garlic, minced
- 3–4 pound pork butt, cut into two-inch cubes
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 2 cups white wine
- 1/2 pound carrots
- 2 Gala apples cored, skins left on and cut up into chunks (or any hard apple but not Granny Smith) *See note
- 2 cups any jarred apple sauce (sweetened or unsweetened – doesn’t matter)
- 2 14.5–ounce cans chicken stock, divided
- 3 bay leaves
- 1 pound new red potatoes, peeled and cut into bite-sized pieces
- 1 pound peeled butternut squash, cut into bite-sized pieces
Instructions
- In a large Dutch oven or heavy bottomed pot, place olive oil and bacon and cook over medium high for 8-10 minutes until the bacon is crispy.
- Add the onions and lower heat to medium low and cook for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally.
- Add garlic and cook for one minute.
- With a slotted spoon or spider, remove bacon and onion mixture to a large bowl.
- Lay pork pieces out and salt and pepper both sides.
- Heat the pot with the bacon fat to medium high and once hot, sear meat in three or four batches. Do not over crowd pan and sear each side for three to four minutes. Remove to bowl with bacon and onions as you sear each batch. The searing process should take 30-40 minutes total. Don’t rush this step; just make sure each piece is nice and golden brown.
- Once the last batch is done, pour the bowl back in the pot and add the white wine. Stir to get all brown bits from bottom of pot.
- Add carrots, apples, apple sauce, one can of stock and bay leaves. Bring to boil, lower to a simmer, and place cover partially on. Simmer for two hours, stirring occasionally.
- After two hours, add second can of stock and the potatoes and bring to a rolling simmer. Cook five minutes then add squash and cook for an additional 15 minutes. (Be careful at this point as the mixture will be thick and if not watched, may stick and burn). The pork is very tender so as you stir, try not to break the meat up too much.
- Once the potatoes and squash are cooked, serve stew in bowls.
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Fall Harvest Vegetarian Corn and Butternut Chowder
Blue Hubbard Squash and White Bean Soup
Slow Cooker Tuscan White Bean Soup
Is there a specific reason you say not to use Granny Smith apples?
Hi Claire – Granny Smith are a more tart apple so it wasn’t the flavor profile we wanted for this recipe.
I made this last night and it is perfect for the fall weather we are just starting to get in the midwest. I was running low on time so I tweaked the finish. After I deglazed the pan with the wine, I dumped everything, including the remaining ingredients into my slow cooker and set it on high and heading off to work for 8 hours. Everything seemed nicely cooked and not too soft. I plan to make it again without the slow cooker but it can be done! I have a 4.5 qt crock pot and it barely fit everything. I definitely recommend a larger one if you got it.
Thanks Stephanie! We get a lot of questions about slow cooker adaptations – it’s so helpful to know what you changed and how it came out!
Is there a way this could be converted for a crock pot?
Hi Brittany – I see both of your comments asking about adapting our recipes for the crock-pot. We’ve only made the recipes as written in our blog post so without some recipe testing I’d only be guessing how these recipes can be adapted for a slow cooker. For both soup/stew recipes, I’m sure you can do at least part of the recipe in the slow cooker. If you try it on your end, please let us know how it comes out!
Hi, thank you for the recipe, I was attempting to hurry through without reading the directions fully first. I learned a valuable lesson this morning. I somehow in my rush read that the bacon and pork should have been cooked together. That was a huge mistake. Growing up in south Louisiana we typically brown most of the meat we cook. I never could get the bacon or pork to brown good enough. It did come out very good, I used a lil savoie’s browning sauce to darken the gravy.
Thanks Mandy – Glad you enjoyed the recipe!
Hi, this recipe sounds delicious, I’m planning on making it for a group of about 20. Can this be easily made as a double batch, or would it be better to cook it in two batches? Thanks!
Hi Ayla – If you have a pot large enough for a double batch, it should be fine cooked that way. Hope you love the recipe!
I am afraid if i ever met these people i would leave home reminds me of the recipes my mother made from scratch without all the bs that is good for us 60 years ago before they had monster groceries stores that made it to simple easy and in most cases ruined our food congratulations stay safe
Thank you Michael! We’re glad our recipes are bringing back some fond memories of your mother’s cooking!
Hi Martha,
A quick note to say this recipe will be on my stove tomorrow…so looking forward to it! Thank you for sharing!
A quick question though if I may….would it be possible to have your recipes in .pdf form as well as print? After buying and losing 2 printers (along with their associated ink/roll costs), and the cost of paper these days, I’m giving up on printing everything out because it’s just become too expensive for those of us on a very fixed income. I was gifted a tablet and have recipes in .pdf form saved to it, so it’s place is in my kitchen…it makes things SO much easier and more accessible.
Thanks for considering! 🙂
Hi Leah! I hope you enjoy the stew! Regarding the PDF option – I just looked at the various settings in my recipe plug-in (Easy Recipe) which formats our recipes and unfortunately I don’t see adding a save to PDF setting that I can turn on. But I will send in a request to the plugin developers and who knows – they may add it as an enhancement in the future. I’m sorry I’m not able to accommodate your request at this time through our plugin. 🙁 Thank you for writing to us Leah!
You’re welcome Leah! Have a great weekend!
Hey Leah,
I have similar issues so when I find these GORGEOUSLY yummy recipes online (with no PDF option) I’ll either copy the page and paste it into word, or (in the case of a tablet) I just share it with my email/send it to myself (I have a special folder for them all)!!!
Thanks NiQue – I’m sorry it isn’t easy to print or save our recipes from mobile devices – its an issue with our recipe plugin. We are looking at some alternative options for our recipe formatting and once we find one that doesn’t cause OTHER problems, hopefully that will fix the printing problem. Thanks for your patience and willingness to copy & paste to print our recipes. We are looking for a solution! Martha
It’s MORE than okay… I do that rather than have the Xtra paper (PLUS I can’t misplace a file, but I DO with paper!!!)
Every recipe I have seen so far look delicious. Can hardly wait to try some.
Thanks Deborah!
Really want to make this delicious looking stew! Just a couple of questions – Can I sub the squash with sweet potato? And, can I use country style ribs or boneless pork loin instead of the pork butt (I have a lot of this in my freezer). Also, does the applesauce make the stew sweet? My husband is fussy and likes savory type stews. Just wondered if it could be left something else? Thanks!
Hi Janet – Generally yes – you can make those substitutions but the cooking time may vary a bit so you’ll have to improvise as you go! The applesauce adds some sweetness but not so much that this isn’t a savory dish. If you are worried about it feel free to reduce the amount or leave it out. Hope it works out for you!
Can you add in towards the end “skim the excess oil off the surface” for a more delicious meal. I’m guessing it’s implied and unfortunately I did not. The recipe is delicious and filling. The three of us each had seconds and there was enough left over for a second meal.
Thanks for your feedback Russell. There shouldn’t be so much excess fat…but if your pork did have a lot of fat on it before cutting into chunks you’d want to trim that off.
So warming and delicious! Pork is really good choice for colder weather. Nice comfort food!
Thank you Medeja!