Guinness Beef Stew

Submitted by Jonathan

This is the warmest, heartiest, manliest dish I can think of for a cold winter's night. Chunks of beef are cooked in a thick brown gravy enriched with 2 bottles of Guinness, resulting in a fragrant stew that retains a hint of stout to make your mouth water. You can use a different stout, such as Samuel Adams, but American brands tend to be somewhat sweeter, so leave out the brown sugar. Suet is rendered beef fat and it adds a deep, creamy, beefy flavour, although using vegetable oil is fine, too. To serve, I like to make thick mashed potatoes, form them into a big ring on each plate, and fill it with stew. Sprinkle some chopped parsley over the top for a bit of color and serve it with the moist Brown Soda bread.

Ingredients

• 5 pounds stew beef, such as chuck, cut into 1 1/2 inch cubes
• 1/2 cup all purpose flour
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• 5 tablespoons suet or vegetable oil (I use vegetable oil)
• 3 to 4 large onions, coarsely chopped
• 1 pound button mushrooms, halved
• 2 (12-ounce) bottles Guinness extra stout
• 2 cups beef stock (I find water mixed with oxo cubes is fine)
• 1 teaspoon brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon dried thyme leaves
• generous pinch of nutmeg
• 4 bay leaves

Method

• In a large bowl, toss the meat, flour, and some salt and pepper until the meat is coated

• Heat the suet or oil in a large dutch oven or stew pot over high heat. When the fat is very hot, add the meat all at once and fry, stirring occasionally, till well browned, about 10 minutes. You're not concerned about cooking it through, only browning the outside. Remove the browned meat from the pot and set aside.

• Add the onions to the same pot and cook over medium until they just start to get translucent, 3 to 4 minutes. Return beef to the pot, and add the mushrooms, stout, stock, sugar, thyme, nutmeg, and bay leaves. Add salt and pepper, using a light hand with the salt at this stage.

• Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat, cover, and simmer gently for 2 hours. Stir occasionally.

• You can serve right away, but this is a stew that tastes even better when reheated the next day.

Variations

Don't forget that this recipe is best served on mashed potatos. Other goons have experimented with adding potato chunks directly to the stew roughly 45 minutes before removing from heat and have claimed good results.

Link to Mashed Potatoes recipe

Link to Brown Soda Bread recipe