Whether with ox or beef, this beer stew or Guinness Irish stew is a traditional recipe that will wow at family meals. The intense flavor of the beer adds a delicious taste to these dishes!
Its preparation is simple, and it is only the cooking that will take time after a few simple steps. Let the simmer do its work!
Below I bring you 2 ways to prepare it:
- Stew in a traditional pot or casserole
- Stew in a traditional pot
You can make this traditional pot stew entirely on the stove, or leave it in the oven. What is recommended, whichever way you prepare it, is to let it rest for a good while to settle the flavors.
You will see that this is a very forgiving recipe: very few prep steps and a fabulous result.
De Buyer Affinity stainless steel saucepan
Ingredients
- 1,5 kg of beef (ox, you can also use cow or veal)
- 1 marrow bone
- 25 g of butter
- 3 tbsp of olive oil
- 100 g of flour
- 1 medium or large onion
- 3 or 4 carrots
- 1 leek
- 200 g of fresh peas (or already thawed)
- 500 ml of Guinness beer
- 1 L of chicken stock
- 4 bay leaves
- A few parsley leaves
- 1 tsp of ginger
- 1 tsp of ground paprika
- Salt
- Pepper
Preparation
1) Preparation of the stew in a traditional pot
- Prepare all the ingredients:
- Cut the meat into large cubes, season with salt and pepper. Dredge the meat in flour, removing the excess, and set aside.
- Peel the onion and chop it finely.
- Peel the carrots and cut them into slices.
- Clean the leek, remove the green part and slice the white part thinly (about 2 mm thick).
- Place a roasting pan, casserole or a steel Shallow Casserole (we have used the De Buyer Affinity) over the heat, at medium intensity.
- Add and melt the 25 g of butter together with 3 tablespoons of oil.
- When melted, add the prepared cubed meat and brown it.
- Also add and brown the marrow bone in the same pot.
- When the meat is nicely browned, remove it to a plate or tray and set aside (do it when it has taken a little color, but not too much, we just want to seal it so it retains juices and flavor, but it will cook later during the stew).
- In the same pot and in the same juices, add the chopped onion and brown it over low heat. If you see there is little oil, you can add one more tablespoon.
- When the onion is translucent, add the carrot slices and season with a little salt.
- Sauté for 2 or 3 minutes and add half a liter of dark beer (Guinness beer). We want to deglaze the preparation*. To do this, bring the beer to a boil.
- While the beer heats up, scrape the bottom of the pan well with a wooden spatula to recover the cooking juices from the meat that had stuck to the bottom.
- When the beer is already reducing and the sauce begins to concentrate, add the spices (bay leaves and 2 sprigs of parsley), and also add one third of the chicken stock.
- Return the reserved meat to the pot now.
- Add the sliced leek at the same time.
- Salt and pepper, adding salt and pepper with your fingers and by eye into the liquid, distributing it throughout the pot. Also add a pinch of ginger (optional) and half a teaspoon of paprika.
- Let cook over the heat, covered, for 1h 30 to 2h**. During cooking, stir the meat and you will need to add stock regularly when you see the liquid in the pot reducing and thickening. In the end, you should have added it all and it must reduce.
- While the stew is cooking, in a separate saucepan boil the peas in salted water. When they begin to be tender, remove, drain and set aside (about 20 min. of cooking).
- In the last stretch of the stew's cooking, add the peas to the pot. If you left them slightly undercooked, add them half an hour before finishing the stew; if you cooked them well, add them in the last 10 minutes before finishing.
- When the stew has reduced the cooking liquid and the meat is cooked and tender, turn off the heat.
- You can serve it the same day, but like any stew it will be ideal if you let the flavors settle until the next day by storing it in the fridge -I assure you you'll notice the difference if you have a few hours of patience!
2) Preparation of the stew in a pressure cooker:
- Prepare all the ingredients:
- Cut the meat into large cubes, season with salt and pepper. Dredge the meat in flour, removing the excess, and set aside.
- Peel the onion and chop it finely.
- Peel the carrots and cut them into slices.
- Clean the leek, remove the green part and slice the white part thinly (about 2 mm thick).
- Place the body of the pressure cooker of 6,5L over the heat, at medium intensity, and add and melt the 25 g of butter together with 3 tablespoons of oil.
- When melted, add the prepared cubed meat and brown it. Also add and brown the marrow bone in the same pot.
- When the meat is nicely browned, remove it to a plate or tray and set aside (do it when it has taken a little color, but not too much, we just want to seal it so it retains juices and flavor, but it will cook later during the stew).
- In the same bottom of the pot and in the same juices, add the chopped onion and brown it over low heat. If you see there is little oil, you can add one more tablespoon.
- When the onion begins to change color, add the carrot slices and season with a little salt.
- Sauté for 2 or 3 minutes and add half a liter of dark beer (Guinness beer). We want to deglaze the preparation*. To do this, bring the beer to a boil (still without covering the pot).
- While the beer heats up, scrape the bottom of the pan well with a wooden spatula to recover the cooking juices from the meat that had stuck to the bottom.
- When the beer is already reducing and the sauce begins to concentrate, add the spices (bay leaves and 2 sprigs of parsley), and add one third of the chicken stock.
- Return the reserved meat to the pot now.
- Add the sliced leek at the same time.
- Salt and pepper, adding salt and pepper with your fingers (by eye) into the stock, distributing it through the liquid. Add a pinch of ginger (optional) and half a teaspoon of paprika.
- Add the rest of the chicken stock to the pot (reserve a finger of stock in a separate glass), and close the pressure cooker with its lid (close the latch so it builds pressure), and let cook over medium heat. When the pressure indicator ring rises, lower the heat to minimum and let cook for 45 minutes.
- While the stew is cooking, in a separate saucepan boil the peas in salted water. When they begin to be tender, remove, drain and set aside (about 20 min. of cooking).
- After the 45 minutes of cooking, turn off the heat and let it lose pressure. When you can open the pot, add the finger of stock you had reserved, add the cooked peas, turn the heat on again and mix with a spoon to distribute the peas. Turn off the heat, you're done!
- You can serve it the same day, but like any stew it will be ideal if you let the flavors settle until the next day by storing it in the fridge -I assure you you'll notice the difference if you have a few hours of patience!
Notes
- *Deglazing is a cooking technique that consists of adding a liquid to a vessel (in this case the pot; it could be a frying pan or the bottom of the pressure cooker, casserole, etc.), in which meat, fish, or vegetables have been cooked. Its aim is to recover the juices that have stuck to the bottom of the vessel. This way you achieve a sauce that concentrates all the flavor and aroma of the food that has been cooked (in our case, the flavor of the previously browned meat, and the sautéed onion and carrot).
- **Instead of making the stew on the stove, you can also cook it in the oven at 160 ºC.
- You could also add the peas to the stew and cook them in the stock, but depending on the type of peas they require more or less time and can easily lose their skins... for all these reasons, plus the fact that the stew is on the heat for a long time and it's hard to know when it will be best to add them so they are just right, it's better to cook them separately and leave them at their point, and add them to the stew at the end of cooking.
- You can accompany the stew with some steamed potatoes, and you'll have a very complete dish.
