Winter Stew

I made this stew on Sunday but we didn't eat it until Monday, as I could let the flavors spend a day diffusing. This is another dish where I was taking advantage of the new dutch over. We had some chicken thighs in the freezer, so I thawed them out, and decided to build a stew around them and some winter veggies (my measurements here are very inexact):

1-2 lbs. Chicken thighs
Salt and Pepper to season
1 lb (approx) Parsnips (chopped 1/4-1/2 in. thick)
1 lb (approx) Sweet Potatoes (chopped 1/4-1/2 in. thick)
2-3 cups Kale (chopped)
5-6 cloves garlic
1 onion, sliced
1 TB tomato paste
1 beer (stout)
Chicken stock
1/4 cup flour

Set oven to 300. Season the chicken and brown it in the dutch oven, medium high, set aside. Heat oil and sautee onion and garlic with the tomato paste, medium low, for 3-5 minutes. Add flour and sautee briefly. Add parsnips and potatoes, chicken, and pour the beer into the pot. Add chicken stock to bring the liquid level up to cover the ingredients halfway. Stir and put the pot, covered, in the oven. After half an hour, add kale. Cook an additional half an hour.

This turned out really well. I think maybe the stout was a bit too strongly flavored—next time I'd consider either a slighly lighter beer, or even some white wine. Some herbs might have flavored it a bit more, as well. A. thinks maybe kale and parsnips are too much, that one or the other would be a better choice, and have a more neutral veggie instead (or beans, since I know kale and white beans is a fairly classic combo). I did like, in this combo, the visual aspect of it—it looked like a basic stew, but the potatoes were actually parsnips and the carrots were actually sweet potatoes. We've got probably 4 servings left over.

There's a basic stew template in the Jan/Feb Cooks Illustrated that was indispensable for this, as it provides a good chart of times for various meats and veggies. This is the best basis for variation I've seen.