A New Mexico Favorite

Bring the water to a boil and add the bouillon cubes and garlic salt., bring to a simmer and leave on the stove. In a separate pot, brown the ground beef and drain as much of the fat as possible, once browned, add to the pot of water. Let simmer for about 15 minutes and add the chopped green chili, let simmer for 2 hours.

Peel and chop the potatoes into 1-2 inch cubes, add all potatoes at the same time and continue to simmer for 20 minutes, at this point the potatoes should be just slightly undercooked which will result in perfect potatoes when you rehydrate this recipe, take the pot off the stove and mix in about 4 cups of ice to cool down the stew to stop the potatoes from cooking.

(OPTIONAL)
Put the stew in the refrigerator overnight so the fat will separate and harden on the top of the stew, you can then just scoop out the fat for a perfect result (Fat does not freeze dry very well and too much can make the stew wet to the touch when done which can shorten the shelf life of the final product)

Fill up the trays trying to keep all trays consistently filled and try to not go over the top by more than a few millimeters, it will be almost impossible to keep the stew below the top of the tray but as long as all trays are about the same you will have great results. For items like stews, we like to use the "Liquid" settings and usually set the ending drying time to 10 hours.

rehydration is very easy, mix about 1:1 ratio of water to freeze dried stew and let sit for about 5 minutes.