Beef Stew Recipe

Tender meat and veggies full of flavour made in one pot

This beef stew recipe is one you will want to come back to. It will make the best dinner especially in the coming autumn and winter days. Slow cooking one pot dishes are really simple because they pretty much make themselves. Follow an easy order in which they go inside the casserole dish and let all the beautiful flavours combine. The meal will be cooking throughout the morning and all you need to do is come back to it a couple time, adding a few more ingredients. As some of them cook faster an others, it’s best to begin with the meat, then add the carrots and potatoes and eventually the garden peas. Essentially, all the ingredients are slowly cooking together and make such tasty, hearty meal! So let’s pop the ‘It’s Complicated’ soundtrack on and begin the beef stew recipe!

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Beef Stew Recipe

Preparation Time: 15 minutes
Cooking Time: 2 and half hours
Serves: 3

Ingredients

500g of lean beef meat
2 tbl spoons of all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon of sweet paprika
a pinch of thyme
a pinch of majoram
1 cube of beef stock
a small can of tomato paste or sliced tomatos
2 large carrots
4 – 5 potatoes
a small cup of garden peas (fresh or frozen)
two cloves of garlic
salt
vegetable oil
an iron casserole dish or a crockpot slow cooker

Instructions

To make this delicious beef stew recipe, begin by cutting the beef meat into larger cubes. Put the flower, paprika, majoram and thyme into a small bowl and mix all together. Then sprinkle the mixture over the beef meat cubes until they are all lightely coated from all sides.

Put a couple of table spoons of vegetable oil into a casserole dish and wait until it is fully heated. This is important before the meat goes in because otherwise the slow heat will make the juice come out. What you want instead is for the sides of the beef cubes to quickly close up and THEN cook slowly. This is what really gives the stew it’s delicious flavour while the meat has time to become beautifully tender as well. Once the oil is heated add the cubes in, only as many to cover the bottom of the pot so the meat can nicely and quickly brown from all sides. If you overcrowd the meat it won’t brown as well and let go of the juice. This makes the meat harder and less tasty as a result. If you have quite a bit of meat to brown, do this in two steps. Brown the first lot first, then take it out of the pot, then brown the rest.

Cooking the meat

When you’ve browned all of your coated beef cubes, add the tomato paste into the dish. Stirr it thoroughly for a couple of minutes to give the paste (or tinned tomatoes) a brisk fry. It will help to turn any sourness into more caramelized flavour. Then add approx. 0.5 l of water, bring to boil and turn the heat down. The meat will now cook for approx. 1.5 hrs covered with a lid. Don’t add salt at this point because it helps to make the beef meat more tender. Check the level of water occassionally to make sure the liquid is just covering the meat.

Adding vegetables

After about an hour and half the kitchen will have the stew fragrance lingering around already. It’s time to add some vegetables so the carrots, garlic and potatoes go in. Peel them beforehand and cut in fairly large pieces. If you prefer to have your beef stews with a potato mash, you can skip adding the potatoes at this point of the recipe. Simply add carrots only, stirr in two crushed cloves of garlic, one beef stock cube and leave to cook for another hour. Keep checking the water to make sure all ingredients are just covered.

Final ingredients

After another hour the stew should nearly be done. At this point put the heat on high, add a cup of frozen/fresh garden peas and stirr thoroughly. Let boil for about 3 – 4 minutes and then turn the heat off. Cover the pot with a lid and leave for another five minutes to allow the peas to settle. And you’re done! Bon appetit!