How to Cook Brown Stew?

dellas1979

How do you cook a brown stew?

What would you put in:

1. Meat (which cut?). Only really like Beef and lean at that.

2. Carrotts and onions

In what order would you cook these? What kind of sauce?

Would you put potatoes in aswell?

hot fuss

If you just ask for stewing beef in the butcher they'll give you beef chunks.. alternatively you can ask for round beef - not sure if it's the same, but that's what I'd ask for when making a stew. A pound of beef should be enough for a stew for two people.

You need to first of all brown the beef on a frying pan - basically fry in olive oil until it's brown. Then set it aside.

I usually add mushrooms, onions and carrots. I'd fry up the mushrooms and onions and leave them aside.

You then need to make up about 400ml of beef stock. Throw this in a saucepan, and add the meat, carrots, mushrooms, onions and seasoning (salt, pepper, herbs).

You then bring this to the boil and then reduce the heat for 1 - 1 and a half hours until the meat is tender.

You can use either cornflour or a roux sauce (butter and flour) to thicken the stew up - some people just prefer to leave it quite soupy!

Another way of doing it is in a casserole dish in the over. I made a gorgeous one last week with a sauce containing stock, brandy and white wine. Then thickened it with roux at the end - very, very tasty.

As regards potatoes, you can cook them in with the stew or separately - that's up to yourself!

Also, as my recipe is very haphazard (I don't follow a recipe, just invent as I go), any of Rachel Allen's books are really good for easy to follow stew recipes..

The Hill Billy

This is my rough & ready recipe... (Feeds 4 hungry souls)

• 1kg stewing beef or shin of beef
• 2-3 medium onions roughly chopped
• 4-5 carrots roughly sliced
• 1/2 medium-sized turnip roughly chopped
• 4-5 celery sticks roughly chopped
• chopped parsley
• a couple sprigs of thyme
• a couple of bay leaves
• 4 cloves garlic chopped finely
• 1 tbsp flour
• 500 ml beef stock (I prefer Oxo myself)
• 1 squirt of tomato pureé
• 2 dashes of Worcestershire sauce
• salt & pepper to taste
• 2 tbsp olive oil

1. Coat the beef pieces in flour & remove any excess.
2. Heat the olive oil on a medium heat, add beef & brown.
3. Add onions & continue to fry for 5 mins.
4. Add remaining ingredients (apart from the parsley) & bring to the boil.
5. Turn down heat & simmer for 1½ to 2 hours.

If you want to add spuds to the stew (which I recommend) - I'd chuck them in 50 mins to 1 hour before you want to serve.