How To Make The Best Homemade Beef Stew – (Hint) It’s Made In The Oven

Hello everyone, and happy Friday! I don’t know if you’ve noticed or not, but summer is all but a distant memory. There has been frost on the car windows, the winds are biting, and it won’t be long before we see our first snowfall of the season. Of course, that can mean only one thing. It is stew season. Nothing warms you up on a frosty afternoon like a big bowl of hearty stew. Well, you’re in luck because today, we will look at all things Beef Stew. We will talk about the best beef to use for stew, other common stew ingredients, what spices and herbs to use, and, most importantly, the best way to cook it. So, without further ado, let’s talk about stew.

---

Best Beef For Stew

It seems pretty obvious that you can’t have beef stew without beef. But, what cut of beef should you use to make your stew? That’s a great question, and there are a lot of options. Before I answer these questions, let’s think about what stew is. Essentially, stew is a thick, slow-cooked soup. Right? The whole point of a stew is to make something filling and hearty with very little. The beauty of this is that because of how it is cooked you can take tough, cheap cuts of meat and make them very tender. Another bonus is that these cheaper, tougher meat cuts have way more flavour than their more expensive, more tender counterparts. That’s a long way to say that you want to use cheap, tough cuts of meat to make stew. Make sense?

For my money, I like inside round the best. It is lean but not too lean. It is very flavourful, and it is relatively cheap compared to other cuts of beef. Some other cuts you can use are Sirloin Tip, pictured below. Beef shank, which is sold as Osso Bucco. Brisket, or even short rib. The last three options, shank, brisket and short rib, used to be very cheap but now are on the higher end of costs. So really, you are looking at inside round or sirloin tip as your best options.

Buying the Beef

I suggest never buying “Stewing Beef” from the grocery store. This will be beef that is already cut up into cubes. You shouldn’t buy this because it is leftover roasts that they couldn’t sell and are trying to save. It’s old meat. Buy a roast. It will be cheaper anyway, and cut it up yourself. It will only add about five minutes to your prep time but will save you money and give you better quality meat. Now, if you have a regular neighbourhood butcher that you go to and trust, you can buy stewing beef from them or even ask them to cut a roast up for you. Otherwise, buy a roast and cut it up.

Cleaning The Beef

You’ve bought a roast, you got it home, and you’re ready to cut it up. What now? There are really only two things that you need to think about at this point. The first is how big do you want to cut your chunks of beef? I prefer to cut them fairly large up to an inch and a half cubed. But the size is completely up to you. The other thing you have to think about is cleaning the beef. Cleaning means to cut away any gristle, sinew, or any other unwanted bits. Essentially, if it isn’t meat, and it isn’t fat, get rid of it.

Cooking The Beef

Because a stew is made up of only a handful of ingredients, it is important to get the most flavour out of those ingredients as possible. The key to getting the most flavour out of your ingredients is colour. You need to brown your meat. I suggest spreading the beef out on a lightly oiled baking sheet and roasting it in the oven at 400°f for 15 to 25 minutes, depending on how big you cut your beef. Once it is browned, it can be added to the rest of the stew ingredients.

---

Beef Stew Ingredients

The stews that I grew up with and mostly make now all have pretty much the same ingredients in them. The base vegetables are onion, garlic, and celery. On top of those are carrot, turnip, parsnips, potato and cabbage. I also like to add some mushroom to the mix to bulk up that meaty flavour. The only vegetable on that list I didn’t use in the example below is parsnip, but only because I forgot to pick some up.

As with the meat, I like large chunks of vegetables in my stew. You can’t really tell from the pictures, but the vegetables are diced to about one-inch cubes. If you cut your vegetables smaller than I do, you will have to adjust the cooking time accordingly.

---

Spices For Beef Stew

Fresh herbs are a great way to add lots of flavour to beef stew. I like using a variety of herbs, including rosemary, thyme, sage, and parsley. The rosemary, thyme, and parsley go into the stew about two-thirds of the way through cooking, while the parsley gets mixed in at the end. You can use rosemary or just use thyme, but adding various herbs will give the stew more flavour and balance.

Fresh Herbs vs. Dried Herbs

I will pretty much always choose fresh herbs over dried herbs. I prefer the flavour, and I always have fresh herbs around. If you prefer dried herbs, that’s fine too, but you should add them much earlier in the cooking process. Dried herbs should be added along with the meat instead of the vegetables.

---

Beef Stew Liquids

A stew needs some liquid. I like to use red wine and beef stock. For the example stew I made, I didn’t have any beef stock handy, so I used water instead. You can use beer instead of wine, or no alcohol at all if you’d prefer. Beef stock will provide more flavour than water, but if you are using store-bought stock, you should watch the salt content because it tends to be high.

When to add the liquids

I like to braise the meat in the alcohol along with the onions and mushroom mix. Then, when I add in the other vegetables, I also add in the water or stock. You can do it that way, or add the alcohol to deglaze the pan after cooking the onions and mushrooms, boil it to burn off the alcohol, and then add the meat, vegetables, and stock. I find that you get more flavour by using the first technique, but I’ll leave that up to you.

---

Thickening the Stew

Truth be told, I generally prefer a relatively thin stew. But that’s just me. I know that most people like it to be thick. That requires a thickener. There are a few different ways that you can thicken your stew. The first is to add some flour to the onions and mushrooms before adding wine or beer. Sprinkle the flour on to the vegetables, cook it for a minute or two, then add the liquid. For a whole batch of stew, you may need about 1-2 tablespoons. Another flour thickening option is to make a roux by mixing equal parts flour and melted butter together, cooking it for a few minutes, then whisking that into the liquid. Both are good options.

My thickener of choice for stew is cornstarch mixed with water. I prefer this mostly because it is gluten-free. But, I also prefer the texture it gives the stew gravy. A whole batch of stew requires about a 1/4 cup of cornstarch mixed with a 1/4 cup of water.

More unconventional thickeners are dried bread or breadcrumbs, arrowroot flour, mashed potato, potato starch, or even rice flour. None of these are really going to give you the smooth, thick gravy that you are used to, but they will thicken it. The dried bread or breadcrumbs is an ancient way to thicken things. It dates back all the way to the ancient Romans and probably earlier. So, if you want to taste a bit of history, maybe give that a try; otherwise, stick to a more conventional thickener.

Starting The Beef Stew

After the beef has been browned, heat an oven-safe dutch oven over medium heat. Add in 2 tbsp of olive oil along with the onion, garlic, celery, and bay leaves. Cook until browned, then add in the mushrooms and cook for another two minutes. Add in the beef and red wine, put a lid on the pot, and put it in the oven at 325°f for 45 minutes.

---

How to Cook Beef Stew In The Oven

Take the pot out of the oven and add all the vegetables and herbs except the parsley. Add enough liquid to come up to the top of the vegetables, then add in the cornstarch and water. Season the stew with salt and pepper, put the lid back on the pot and put it back in the oven at 325°f for an hour and a half or until the vegetables and meat are tender.

---

---

Optional Ingredients

One ingredient that I didn’t add to my stew but that you absolutely can is tomato paste. If you add it, it will go in when the mushrooms do before the meat and the wine. Use about two tablespoons for a whole batch of stew. The tomato paste will give the stew a certain depth of flavour that it otherwise won’t have. I didn’t use it in my example stew because I thought I had some in the cupboard and didn’t buy any because of that. It turns out I didn’t have any at all.

One final ingredient in the recipe above that I haven’t mentioned yet is butter. I love to finish my stew with a tablespoon or two of butter. I drop it right into the pot and gently stir it in. This does three things. First of all, it gives the gravy a silky mouthfeel and texture. Secondly, it makes the gravy shine. Finally, it makes it taste amazing. You can do this or not, but I really suggest that you do it.

Conclusion

You can make a stew from beef to bison to chicken to turkey to mushrooms to vegetables. The principles I outlined in this post apply to all stew, not just beef stew. Let’s be honest here; beef stew is a common kind of stew and my personal favourite. I hope you’ve enjoyed this post and if you have any stew related question that I didn’t answer here, please ask me in the comments sections below or on Facebook.

Thank you for reading the post. If you liked it, remember to share it on Facebook, Pinterest, or Twitter by clicking the icon to the left of the page. Did you know that Chefsnotes.com has almost 400 posts just like this one? Don’t ever miss a post again. Become a Chef’s Notes member right here. You will be notified of every new post. And if you would like to know more about me, click the link below to read my story.