Who has a good beef stew recipe?

I have a hankering for some good, rich lovely beef stew and I don't have a good recipe. What's yours? I'm looking for something with very tender big chunks of beef, potatoes, carrots, rich beefy flavor... old-fashioned comfort food.

Oh, and I don't have a crock pot, so I need a stove-top or oven-roast method.

Can you help?

I have long had a paper copy of this, but just found it on the web, too. It's the same recipe. Supposedly this was made for Ike during his tenure as Supreme Allied Commander in WWII.

Now ... you said you wanted tender beef. This recipe calls for USDA Prime Round. While that sounds good, it ain't tender! I'd suggest you get a few chuck eye steaks and cut them into stew meat yourself. Chuck eye is the forequarter end of the rib eye. It is as tender as can be, but ugly. Where the rib eye has a nice round muscle, the chuck eye just has the small end of that muscle, where it joins a few other muscles. So what you get is a steak that has a lot of silver skin seams in it. Even raw it is likely to come apart if you handle it too much. But this works perfectly for stew.

And the basic recipe, as jamie Oliver says, is easy peasy.

Herewith ........

Beef Stew: Eisenhower's Recipe

Yield: 6 servings

Description:
2 lb stewing beef, (prime round)
1 lb potatoes, irish, small
1 bn carrots
1/4 lb onions
2 ea tomatoes, fresh
1 x assorted spices, (thyme, bay Leaves, Garlic, etc.,) in a cheesecloth bag
2 1/2 pt beef stock
1 x salt, to taste
1 x Pepper, to taste

Directions:

Stew meat until tender, add vegetables and spices. Cook until vegetables
are done, strain off one cup of stock from stew, thicken slightly with
beef roux mixture. Pour back into stew and let simmer until ready to
serve (about 1/2 hour.) Remove cloth bag of spices.
Makes 6 servings.

I guess this could really be called a "tried and true" recipe!

Thanks! Between you and Warpy and MikeC, I should be able to make something reasonably good.

Question - do I want to cut out that silvery skin when I cut up the beef?

Thanks!

That long, slow simmering will make the whole business fall-apart tender.

The only thing I ever removed was large areas of undigestible tallow. Blech. A little bit flavors the stew. A whole lot of it makes for a layer of white grease on the top as it cools.

I think it actually contributes to the silkiness of the gravy in a long-cooked stew. The collagen fibers should simply cook into the gravy if they're simmered for a while-- that's essentially how hide glue is made. Sort of.

worry not ... just enjoy.

but I've found out the best way to get maximum flavor out of an Irish stew is to dredge the stew beef lightly in flour and then not just brown it, come close to burning it. Get a real overdone sear on the outside of that stew beef, caramelize it, get lots of semi burnt stuff stuck to the bottom of the pot. Then add chopped onion and celery and stir to soften slightly. Add your liquid (stock or a mixture of red wine and water) and deglaze the bottom of the pot. Put the beef back in, cover, and simmer on very low heat for several hours. An hour or so before you want to eat, put the potatoes, carrots, and other firm veggies into the pot. Add the extras like frozen peas at the end.

I thicken the liquid with all sorts of stuff, depending on how I feel and what I have sitting around. Oatmeal ground to a powder does a great job, as does cornmeal, cornstarch and stale rye bread. Or just mash some of the potato into it. It's flexible beyond belief.

Seasonings during the simmering can be flexible, too. Sometimes I use bay, sometimes I use basil, sometimes I use a bit of caraway. Tomato paste can be added to the stock.

In other words, there are as many recipes as their are cooks and their moods. You can't go wrong with meat, onions, celery, carrots, and potatoes, though. It's always going to be good.

When I make a beef stew I dredge the meat chunks in flour and brown them in a little fat, then deglaze the skillet with some of the beef stock, or a little wine, to scrape up all the browned bits and put them into the stew.

to making a good rich flavor.

Thanks! I'll try this for Monday and see what I come up with.

I'll get a roast to fix on Monday. Thanks for sharing your tips, Warpy.