Simple Beef Stew Recipe
Even when I am only cooking dinner for two to four people, I always make stew for six. It’s a great double (or triple!) duty recipe that you can use the leftovers from the night before to make fresh meals throughout the week. Throw a couple scrambled eggs on the side and you’ve got a hearty steak and eggs breakfast. Don't have the time to make ragu from scratch during the week? Use up all that beefy goodness with some pasta and you've got a killer ragu that tastes like you spent all day working on it. If you’ve really made too much to eat your way through in the next few days, it freezes great too!
This recipe is served with fries that my mom made growing up that we called ‘pucky huddles’ and a garlicy horseradish cream sauce that gets poured under the stew and over the fries.
Recipe featured on Rachael Ray's Meals in Minutes.
Ingredients
- 1 bulb of garlic, cloves cracked from jackets, plus 3 more cloves of crushed garlic
- About ½ cup of olive oil
- 1 pint of half-n-half
- 1 round tablespoon prepared horseradish or freshly grated horseradish
- Salt and pepper
- White pepper, optional
- About ½ cup vegetable or safflower oil
- 3 pounds (1 ½ Kilo) beef chuck, cut into 1 ½ to 2 inch cubes
- About ⅔ cups of flour
- 3 carrots, peeled, quartered and chopped
- 2 large onions, peeled and chopped
- 1 large fresh bay leaf
- 1 rounded teaspoon of juniper berries
- 1 large bundle of rosemary and thyme, tied with kitchen twine
- 1 bottle of red wine, I like to use a Tuscan red such as Montecucco or Rosso di
- Montalcino
- 2 cups of beef stock
Directions
In a small saucepan, cook all of the garlic cloves except for the 3 crushed cloves in olive oil over low heat until soft but be careful not to brown. Add in the half-n-half, bring to boil then reduce heat to medium. Let thicken for 10-12 minutes. Remove from the heat and add the horseradish then puree until smooth with an immersion blender being careful not to splatter since the liquid is very hot. Season the sauce with salt and white or fine black pepper then cover and reserve for later.
Heat vegetable or safflower oil over medium high heat in a large dutch oven.
Season meat generously with salt and pepper and toss with flour to coat evenly.
Brown meat in batches so as not to crowd the pot. Each batch should take about 7-8 minutes to brown. Remove browned meat to a platter.
Add carrots, onions, bay leaf, juniper berries, herb bundle, 3 cloves of crushed garlic and season with salt and pepper. Let soften for 5-6 minutes, then add back the beef. Add the wine and reduce it by half then reduce the heat to a low simmer and cook covered until the meat is very tender, about 2-2 ½ hours. Add the beef stock if the sauce thickens too much or the pan begins to look dry. Remove the herb bundle and bay leaf.
Meanwhile, prepare the potatoes.
To serve, reheat the garlic cream sauce over low heat if needed. The sauce can be poured in a bowl with the stew ladled on top as well as poured over the fries or simply passed at the table.
