If you remember Humphrey’s Restaurant on Whitesboro Street in West Utica, you may remember the mushroom stew.

We recently came across an old newspaper clipping that not only mentions the restaurant and its mushroom stew — it gives us the recipe and tells us a little about where it came from.

The clipping begins with a request from Coralyn Lawrence of New Hartford, who was looking for the mushroom stew her mother remembered eating at Humphrey’s Restaurant in West Utica.

The answer came through Don Dembowski, whose father, Andy Dembowski, had operated the restaurant before it became Humphrey’s. According to the clipping, after Humphrey’s took over, a member of the Dembowski family continued working for the Humphreys and regularly made the stew.

The newspaper then printed the recipe under the heading:

Andy Dembowski’s Mushroom Stew

So while this was the mushroom stew people remembered eating at Humphrey’s, the recipe actually went back to the Dembowski family and the restaurant that preceded it.

And this was no little pot of stew. The old recipe starts with four to five pounds of Boston butt and two pounds of fresh mushrooms.

Andy Dembowski’s Mushroom Stew

Transcribed from the old newspaper clipping.

Ingredients

• 4 to 5 pounds lean Boston butt
• 4 medium onions
• 2 ribs celery
• 2 or 3 cloves garlic
• 2 28-ounce cans tomatoes, plus a little water
• Salt and pepper to taste
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• A few drops of hot pepper sauce (optional)
• 4 medium green peppers
• 2 pounds fresh mushrooms

Directions

Cube the meat and brown it in hot oil.

Chop the onions and celery and add them to the meat. Mince the garlic and add it to the pan.

When the meat has browned, add the tomatoes and seasonings. Cook over low heat until the meat is tender.

Twenty minutes before serving, add the sliced mushrooms and chopped green peppers. Cook only until the peppers are tender. The original recipe cautions that if they’re cooked too long, they’ll get mushy.

An Old Utica Favorite

The clipping says the writer called Don Dembowski about the recipe. Don said he had shared it with all his neighbors and that they made it regularly. The writer finished with quite an endorsement, calling it the best mushroom stew she’d ever tasted.

Mushroom stew is one of those old Utica-area dishes that can bring back very different memories depending on whose kitchen or neighborhood restaurant you visited. Families and restaurants had their own versions.

What makes this particular recipe so interesting is the trail preserved in that old clipping: Andy Dembowski operated the restaurant, it later became Humphrey’s, and a member of the Dembowski family continued making the stew there after the changeover.

All these years later, the recipe survives.

Do you remember eating mushroom stew at Humphrey’s? Or did your family have its own mushroom stew recipe?

Recipe transcribed from the vintage newspaper clipping. The newspaper and publication date have not yet been identified.