Irish Stout Beef Stew
St. Paddy’s Day is in less than a week and with a last name like McNamara you best know we celebrate this holiday every single year.
Traditionally we make corned beef and cabbage, but this year I wanted to do something a little different. I wanted to make an Irish stew with a little stout added to the mix. Besides the glorious and robust flavor stout brings to this already amazing stew, you’ll also find carrots, parsnips and turnips… oh and raisins too. The raisins absorb all the amazing flavors and plump up and add a delicious sweetness.
I’m not kidding you when I say I LOVE THIS STEW! It’s incredibly hearty, flavorful and the meat just melts in your mouth. Besides a spoon to get the stew from the bowl and into your mouth, I must highly suggest a hearty bread to mop up that stew-y gravy left in the bottom of the bowl. Your St. Patrick’s Day won’t be complete without this stew in your life.
Instead of purchasing ready-cubed stew meat, I like to buy a big-o chuck roast and cube it myself. This way I can select a piece of beef without a lot of gristle and can cube it up as big as I like.
My chuck roast was a little over two pounds, but as long as the roast is 2lbs to 2-1/2 pounds you’re golden. Now, cutting up the roast is easy. I cut the roast into strips about 1-1/2 inches and cubed it into bite size pieces, and when I say bite-size I mean big bites. Go big or go home, ya know?
Throw the cubed meat into a bowl and sprinkle it with 3/4 teaspoon of kosher salt.
Sprinkle that with a 1/4 cup of all-purpose flour and toss to coat.
Each piece of beef should be perfectly coated, not to heavy and not to light.
In your Dutch oven, add a tablespoon of the oil and heat over medium high.
Work in batches and sear each piece so a nice dark crust forms.
Transfer to a plate or any dish for that matter and move on to the next batch. It takes me 3 batches to cook all the meat, I like to work in batches so the meat doesn’t crowd the pan and steam instead of sear.
Reduce the temp of the pot and quickly dice up a yellow onion. I seriously cry tears of pain with each and every slice and chop made, there really needs to be a cure for this!
See all that dark brown goodness? Don’t scrape it out and throw it away… trust me on this.
Throw in the 4 cups of diced onions.
Stir it up and cook the onions for 5-8 minutes until soft and translucent.
Measure a heaping tablespoon of tomato paste, so it’s more like a tablespoon and a half.
Give it all a good stir and cook for one minute.
Now comes the fun part. Crack open an Irish stout beer. I used Killian’s… but Guinness would work too!
Pour in the entire bottle and use a wooden spoon to scrape up those brown bits on the bottom of the pan.
Pour in 32 ounces {4 cups} beef broth.
Add the browned beef…
… A half teaspoon of kosher salt…
And 3/4 teaspoon of caraway seed.
Add in a palm-full or two tablespoons golden raisins.
Then lastly, add in a good amount of black pepper.
Give a good stir and bring to a boil.
Reduce the heat to a simmer, put a lid on it and let it simmer away for 50 minutes.
After the time is up, remove the lid and give it another stir. Now increase the heat to medium-high and let it bubble away with the lid off for 45 minutes.
While all that’s going on, prep the veggies. I peeled and chunked the carrots, parsnips and turnip into bite size pieces.
When the 45 minutes were up I threw those in until they were fork tender… about 25 minutes. In the meantime the veggies soften and the beer/broth mixture thickens into the most scrumptious gravy. Total comfort food fo sho.
LOOOOOOK! Oh gosh… I’m just… utterly… speechless. Yeah you really don’t believe that do you? Psshh that’s like totally impossible.
This stout stew is amazing. The stout is subtle, the beef is all melty and I lurve the switch up of root vegetables in this stew. I brought the leftovers to work and it could be possible that this stew was even better the next day!
Now go on and get your stew on!
Irish Stout Beef Stew
A beef stew chockfull of beef, beer and root vegetables!
Yield: 6 servings
Prep Time: 25 minutes
Cook Time: 2 hours
Total Time: 2 hours and 25 minutes
Ingredients:
3 tablespoons Olive Oil
1/4 cup All Purpose Flour
2 to 2-1/2 pounds Beef Chuck Roast, cut into 1-1/2 inch cubes
1-1/4 teaspoons Kosher Salt, divided
4 cups diced Yellow Onion
1-1/2 tablespoons Tomato Paste
1 {11 oz.} bottle of Irish Stout Beer {like Killian's or Guinness}
4 cups Beef Broth
2 tablespoons Golden Raisins
3/4 teaspoon Caraway Seeds
1/2 teaspoon Black Pepper
3 Carrots, peeled and diagonally sliced 1/2 inch thick
2 Parsnips, peeled and diagonally sliced 1/2 inch thick
1 medium sized Turnip, peeled and cubed into bite size pieces
2 tablespoons Minced Parsley, for garnish
Directions:
Toss the cubed beef chuck roast with 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt and the 1/4 cup of all purpose flour until the beef is lightly coated.
Heat a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Once hot pour in a tablespoon of olive oil. Sear a third of the beef until a deep golden crust forms. Remove and repeat with the remaining beef and oil in two more batches. Transfer all the beef into a clean platter and set off to the side.
Place the diced onion into the Dutch oven and cook for 5-8 minutes until soft and translucent. Add in the tablespoon and a half of tomato paste and cook for one minute.
Pour in the bottle of Irish stout beer and scrape up the browned bits on the bottom of the pot. Pour in the 32 ounces {4 cups} beef broth and add the beef back in. Season with the remaining 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, the caraway seeds, black pepper and the golden raisins. Stir and bring to a boil, reduce the heat to a simmer, cover and cook for 50 minutes.
Remove the lid, stir and bring back to a boil for 45 minutes.
When the time is up, add in the prepared veggies and cook with the lid off for 25 minutes or until the vegetables are fork tender.
Serve in a big bowl with minced parsley sprinkled over top and a slice of crusty bread. Enjoy!
Over the past few years I’ve been on a mission to find and create recipes that I can make from scratch. I hope you enjoy the recipes on this blog as they are tried and true from my kitchen to yours! (
I wish I was in the least bit Irish so I’d have a good reason to celebrate St. Patricks Day. There’s so many delicious recipe popping up lately but I have no one who will celebrate with me…..:(
Yum! I love me some Irish food!
Stoooooooooout! I love stout! And i love it in my stew! Your st. paddy’s stew looks so hearty and it reminds me we should be making stews like this year-round, st. paddy’s day or not!!
Sounds amazing! I Love the addition of the stout!
Looks delicious! Guess I’ll be switching up my corned beef and cabbage and making this instead! Thanks!
WHAT. I’m going in.
This stew looks soo good it makes me want to start eating beef!
Gorgeous step & amazing flavors. Love this one!
This stew looks amazing!! Sounds perfect for St. Patrick’s Day!!
Beef stew sounds so good right now on this dreary Tuesday! And all the ingredients paired together sound perfect for each other.
I love that you actually celebrate St. Patrick’s Day! The stew looks perfect.
I like the different rout you are taking! I would take this stew any day over corned beef and cabbage!
This look so warm and comforting! I love it!
You had me at Stout.
We can get an Irish Beef Stew from our local soup and sandwich pub. But we have been looking for a recipe that we could try at home. As for the Stout, I think that Killians is a bit lighter than Guinness. Both very good beers. I’m very glad to see that you left 5 beers for enjoying with the Stew. Thanks
I’ve been looking for a recipe for sunday and this one fits the bill perfectly! thanks!
I think the recipe omits putting the beef back in the pot. I’m cooking it right now and it smells great!!!
simplyscratch replied: — March 17th, 2013 @ 11:20 am
Thanks Phil! I just saw that and added it. Thanks for letting me know and I hope you enjoy the stew!
I made this yesterday for dinner, and it was fantastic! I had never had turnips before and they were delicious. Thank you for a great recipe!
I made this for St. Patrick’s Day yesterday and had a friend over. It was a big hit! Perfect, because my husband hates cabbage, so corned beef and cabbage was out. This was perfect! Thank you for sharing!
Hmmmm……it;s still March, and……..we’re Irish, so…………..and there are many Irish Saints we can credit, if we need a reason other than YUM!
This stew was the BOMB!!!! Delicious…I didn’t have golden raisins in my pantry…so used regular…no problem!!! This recipe is definitely a “keeper”!
Thanks, Laurie
This looks SO yummy, I was reading on Tasty Kitchen and considering what al I have in my pantry and freezer and — the instructions on the recipe (on their site) neglect to add the beef back to the pot after adding the broth, etc. I’m not a Tasty Kitchen member, so I can’t comment there.
Came here, the post is accurate and even more yummy looking on your site here with all the pictures, so I wondered if you’d want to make the correction.
simplyscratch replied: — March 28th, 2013 @ 7:37 pm
Thanks for the heads up! I’ll make sure to correct it on TK!
Even if it’s not St Paddy’s Day & you’re not Irish you should definitely try this stew it is the best! I left out the raisins (cos I don’t like them) carraway seeds & turnip(just cos I couldn’t get them) but put in extra carrot & parsnip. And instead of simmering for 50 mins, adding the veggies & simmering for another25 mins, I threw the veggies in the pot & put it in a 350 degree oven for 1hr…..it was terrific!! I have been using a slow cooker beef stew for years…..I think this will be used more from now on!!
oops …..beef stew recipe
Made this delicious stew tonight and everyone LOVED it! I added a few more veggies and a can of beans and it was deeeelish!