Ah, Sunday . . . just about my favorite day of the week. I get to sleep in a bit, read the paper, sing with choir and spend nearly my entire afternoon deciding what to make for dinner – well, after I catch up with friends, finish the laundry I started yesterday, check on my folks, get my miles in, grab some groceries and get my hair cut.

Given my absurdly long to-do list, it’s a good thing I’ve already picked tonight’s main course.

It’s called Mountain Man Stew. Now, before you take offense at the name of the recipe or imagine that I’m about to let some big, burly flannel-shirted guy into my kitchen, let me just say that I got this beefy recipe from a Boy Scout who just happens to be a member of my immediate family. I’ll say no more.

Submitted to allrecipes.com by “Mike”, the description reads, A heart stew! Invented in the mountains of Pennsylvania. Serve with bread and butter. Serves 4.

In what I now realize was a knee-jerk reaction, when I first made this recipe a year ago, I doubled it.

Given the volume of stew it produced, I could only assume two things: 1) my math skills are sorely lacking, or 2) the mountains of Pennsylvania are teeming with giants.

We had leftovers for a week.

But that’s the only reason I haven’t made it since then. And this time, instead of serving it with bread and butter as recommended by chef Mike, I’m adding dumplings – the better to eat it with, my dears.

Now, about that laundry…