Hearty Beef Stew with Peas, Carrots, and Potatoes
This super rich and hearty Beef Stew is the perfect weekend dinner to warm you up. This stew features beautifully marbled pieces of beef chuck, which are braised alongside red wine, balsamic vinegar, thyme, onions, and of course carrots, potatoes, and peas for substance. This beef stew recipe is thick and chunky, as any great stew should be, and is full of savory and deep, rich flavors. Serve this beef stew with a piece of beautiful crusty bread, and you have yourself one heart-warming dinner!
Beef & Braising
The beef used in stew recipe is beef chuck roast, which is a beautifully marbled cut of meat. This cut features a great array of marbled fat throughout, and also features a great deal of connective tissue. With a cut like this, slow cooking is a necessity. Although an initially tough cut, the slow cooking process breaks down the fat and connective tissue into collagen, which dissolves into gelatin. This melting away of the connective tissue causes the meat to become “fall off the bone tender”. The gelatin, which has married with the braising liquid, gives the sauce that succulent mouth feel that cannot be mimicked in any other way. However, the catch with achieving this is that it must be slow cooked at a relatively low temperature. At higher temperatures, the muscle fibers of the meat actually toughen – leading to tough, chewy meat. That is why we always braise at 300°F or 325°F, for several hours.
Beef Cut Variations
If you cannot find beef chuck roast, it could be called by a few other names – Chuck Eye Roast, Pot Roast, Chuck Roll Roast, Beef Shoulder/Blade Roast, for example. Alternatives are top blade roast, bottom chuck roast, skirt steak, or even boneless short ribs. Really, anything with a great amount of marbling.
Beef Stew that Gets Better with Age
Now I know many foods are best eaten fresh, but most braised dishes are typically better the next day! So, the plus side of making this stew is that the leftovers (if there is any!) are going to be insanely good! As the beef stew sits overnight, a few things happen. First, the complex carbs, such as the potatoes and carrots, break down further causing a greater deal of flavor and sweetness. Second, allowing the stew to sit overnight also releases a whole lot more delicious umami flavor! The reasoning for this is because the reheating process further breaks down the proteins, thereby releasing more amino acids for tasting – which increases that savory umami goodness! Third, the aromatic properties that are within this stew, namely the onions, garlic, and thyme, also become more flavorful and aromatic with reheating. What all this mumbo-jumbo means is that the beef stew truly, even on a molecular level, becomes more flavorful!
The Secret Ingredient: Parmesan Rind
You may have noticed that this recipe calls for the addition of a parmesan rind. If you have never used parmesan rinds in your cooking before, boy are you in for a treat! Adding in a parmesan rind, which you would typically just throw out, gives a crazy boost to the flavor! Parmesan, and it’s rind, are full of umami savory flavors. These umami flavors are what add richness and depth to a dish. As I mentioned in my Greek Salad Recipe, when it comes to umami “1+1=8”. When a dish has several umami-laced components, they not only compliment each other, but they actually amplify each others effects! This leads to a dish with is beautifully round, rich in flavor, and has that indescribable depth to it. You can find parmesan rinds at your grocery store possibly (mine always has them), or definitely at any sort of cheese market. I buy them in bulk and just store them in my freezer, for whenever I need them. However, if you do not have any parmesan rinds, just use about 1/3 cup shredded Parmigiano Reggiano.
Get the Recipe: Hearty Beef Stew with Carrots, Peas, and Potatoes
Ingredients
- 3 lbs Boneless Beef Chuck Roast, trimmed of any large pieces of fat and cut into 1 ½” pieces
- 2-3 tbsp Vegetable Oil, divided
- 2 Medium Yellow Onions, diced medium
- 10 Garlic Cloves, crushed or minced
- 1 tsp Dried Thyme
- 3 tbsp Balsamic Vinegar
- 2 tbsp Tomato Paste
- 1/4 cup Flour
- 1 Bottle Dry Red Wine
- 4 cups Low Sodium Beef Broth
- 1 Bay Leaf
- 1 ½ tbsp Sugar
- 1 tsp Salt
- 1/2 tsp Freshly Ground Pepper
- 1 Parmesan Rind
- 4 Large Carrots, peeled and sliced into 1” slices
- 1 lb Yellow Baby Potatoes, sliced in half
- 1 cup Frozen Peas
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325°F, with the rack in the bottom position.
- Pat the beef pieces dry, and season them well with salt and pepper. Heat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Add 1 tbsp of oil, and place beef pieces in, ensuring not to overcrowd. In batches, brown the pieces on each side and then remove and place onto a plate. Continue browning in batches until all the beef has been browned (typically this takes me 3-4 batches). Set aside the plate of browned beef.
- Turn the heat down to medium and add the onions to the Dutch oven. Fry until the onions begin to look translucent, about 3 minutes. Add the garlic and thyme, cook for an additional minute. Then add in the balsamic vinegar and the tomato paste, cook for 2 minutes. Then add the browned beef and it’s juices back into the Dutch oven. Sprinkle with the flour, and stir until well combined and the flour dissolves.
- Add in the wine, beef broth, bay leaf, sugar, salt, pepper and parmesan rind. Stir to combine. Cover the Dutch oven with the lid and place into the oven. Braise for 2 hours.
- After 2 hours, remove the Dutch oven from the oven, and add in the carrots and baby potatoes. Return to the oven to braise for 55 more minutes.
- After 55 minutes, add the frozen peas, and cook for an additional 5 minutes. Remove from oven, remove the bay leaf and parmesan rind, and serve.
- (Optional) If reheating, place into the oven at 350°F until hot.
Source: Adapted from Once Upon a Chef
