I always find stew being comfort food, it’s one of those dishes that you want on a cold evening or just want a nice family cooked meal. When doing slow cooked beef, the meat tastes incredibly tender. With the addition of balsamic and a number of spices, it really adds some extra tasty flavours.
I made this stew using a casserole dish and cooking it slowly in the oven on a low heat, but it can also be cooked in a slow cooker with the same results. The first thing I wanted to make sure I did was cook with some nice quality beef. If you are looking for your meat to be tender then not only is it cooked slowly, you also need to make sure you use decent tender meat.
I purchased a nice joint of beef and sliced and diced this into smaller chunks. These chunks were placed into the casserole dish with chopped red pepper, green pepper, carrots, sweet potato and chopped onion.
This makes up the bulk of the slow cooked beef stew, you then want to add 2 tins of chopped tomatoes, 1L of beef stock and 1 tin of tomato puree to give it that extra flavour and thickness.
To give it that extra flavour I added two tablespoons of balsamic glaze, 1 tsp of ground garlic, 2 tsp of smoked paprika. Everything was stirred together to ensure all of spices are completely mixed together.
I then placed the lid on the casserole dish and placed it into the oven on 75 degrees, where I left it to cook for 5-6 hours. By letting it cook for this amount of time you will not only cook the vegetables but also the beef will be very tasty and tender.
To accompany the balsamic slow cooked beef stew I wanted to have some tasty mash potato but wanted to give it a little extra flavour. I therefore wanted to make a nice spring onion mash with a yummy creamy texture. I started doing the mash after the stew had been in the oven for 5 hours, I peeled and chopped the potatoes into quarters and then chopped 3 spring onions and placed these into a saucepan with the potatoes and salted water.
I let these cook on a medium heat until the potatoes were soft enough to place a fork through. To give it that nice creamy taste I drained the water, added a good tablespoon of butter and some milk. This was then mashed for a good 5 minutes to ensure that it was nice and smooth without any lumps.
Prior to serving the balsamic slow cooked beef stew I added a good couple of tablespoons of gravy and mixed it up, this gave it that little extra thickness. I placed a good bit of mash on the plate and covered with the tasty stew….YUMMY!!
PrintBalsamic Slow Cooked Beef Stew
Stew is perfect winter food, when its cold outside its nice to have something warm in your belly. The Balsamic adds a little extra flavour to the tender beef.
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Cook Time: 180 minutes
- Total Time: 185 minutes
- Yield: 4 1x
- Category: Main
- Cuisine: English
Ingredients
- 600 g of diced beef
- 1 Red Pepper
- 1 Green Pepper
- 2 Carrots
- 2 Sweet Potatoes chopped
- 1 Large onion chopped
- 2 Tins of chopped tomatoes
- 1 L of Beef stock
- 1 Tin of tomato puree
- 2 tbsp Balsamic Glaze
- 1 tsp ground garlic
- 2 tsp smoked paprika
- 5 potatoes
- 3 Spring onions
- 2 tbsp Butter
- cup Halfof milk
- 2 tbsp gravy granules
Instructions
- Chop the beef into chunks and place into a casserole dish
- Add the chopped red and green peppers along with chopped carrots, sweet potato and chopped onions.
- To these ingredients add the two tins of chopped tomato, the beef stock and 1 tin of tomato puree.
- Add the balsamic glaze along with the spices and give everything a good mix together
- Put the lid on and place it in a preheated oven at 75 degrees for 5-6 hours.
- When the stew is nearly ready, peel and chop the potatoes and place in a saucepan along with 3 spring onions chopped
- Add salted water to the saucepan and heat on a medium heat until the potatoes are soft
- Once the potatoes are done, drain the water, add the butter and milk and mash till all lumps are gone.
- Take the casserole out of the oven and add the gravy granules, mix until the granules have dissolved and the stew thickens.
- Place the mash on the plates and top with the balsamic slow cooked beef stew
Nutrition
- Calories: 570
- Sugar: 13.1
- Sodium: 711.2
- Fat: 14.9
- Saturated Fat: 7.4
- Carbohydrates: 66.8
- Fiber: 10.1
- Protein: 45.6
- Cholesterol: 112.8