Jamie Oliver Beef Stew

Our moms are on their way here and arrive tomorrow and it's hard to say who's more excited - me or them. To celebrate their first night in London, I wanted to make something comforting, wintry, and undeniably home-cooked. 

When we first started getting our veg boxes, I found this recipe for beef stew by Jamie Oliver. It's a somewhat unusual stew, including ingredients like sage and squash and parsnips that my mom never put into her stews at home, but I have fallen in love with it. First of all, stewing beef means I can't mess it up and it comes out melt-in-your-mouth tender no matter what I do to it. In fact, Jamie Oliver specifically recommends throwing the beef in raw and NOT browning it beforehand. Secondly, this stew is easy to re-heat on the stove top and actually tastes better the second time once some of the vegetables have broken down and melded into a thick, flavorful sauce. (Which explains why I'm making it tonight for their arrival tomorrow...) I am really excited to share this one with my favorite home cook!

an old ingredients picture

Ingredients

• olive oil

• 1 knob butter 

• 1 onion, peeled and chopped

• 1 handful fresh sage leaves 

• 800 g quality stewing steak or beef skirt, cut into 5cm pieces

• sea salt

• freshly ground black pepper

• flour, to dust

• 2 parsnips, peeled and quartered

• 4 carrots, peeled and halved

• ½ butternut squash, halved, deseeded and roughly diced

• 1 handful Jerusalem artichokes, peeled and halved, optional (these will eventually come in an Abel & Cole box. Until then, I will wait to try them out.)

• 500 g small potatoes

• 2 tablespoons tomato purée

• ½ bottle red wine

• 285 ml organic beef or vegetable stock

• finely grated zest of 1 lemon

• 1 handful rosemary, leaves picked

• 1 2/3/4 clove garlic, peeled and finely chopped

a new ingredients picture (I had butternut squash already cut up from my throw-everything-in pork stew)

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 160ºC/300ºF/gas 2. 
2. (The missing step in every recipe - spend a LONG time cutting all of the vegetables.) 

   

   really missing pre-cut butternut squash from Costco

   
   

   

   I had some mushrooms this time so I threw those in too

   
   
   
   
   
3. Put a little oil and your knob of butter (such a British term - I usually use about a tablespoon or less) into an appropriately sized pot or casserole pan (you mean my Dutch oven that I use for everything including as a mixing bowl and for salads?). Add your onion and all the sage leaves and fry for 3 or 4 minutes. 
   
4. Toss the meat in a little seasoned flour (since this direction is so abstract, I chose to add fresh pepper, dried garlic, and a touch of cinnamon to it), then add it to the pan with all the vegetables, the tomato purée, wine and stock, and gently stir together. 
   
5. Season generously with freshly ground black pepper and just a little salt. (I also put about 3/4 of the garlic in at this point.) Bring to the boil, place a lid on top, then cook in the preheated oven until the meat is tender. Sometimes this takes 3 hours, sometimes 4 – it depends on what cut of meat you're using and how fresh it is. The only way to test is to mash up a piece of meat and if it falls apart easily it's ready. Once it's cooked, you can turn the oven down to about 110°C/225°F/gas ¼ and just hold it there until you're ready to eat. 
   

According to Jamie Oliver: The best way to serve this is by ladling big spoonfuls into bowls, accompanied by a glass of French red wine and some really fresh, warmed bread. Mix the lemon zest, chopped rosemary and garlic together and sprinkle over the stew before eating. Just the smallest amount will make a world of difference – as soon as it hits the hot stew it will release an amazing fragrance.

An old pic of re-heated stew. It may not look it, but it's delicious!

So excited for tomorrow!!