This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy.
This Red Wine Beef Stew is rich and hearty, with tender beef and a velvety, savory sauce that you will not believe!
This stew, you guys, YOU GUYS. I am so happy with it. Don’t you hate it when you imagine a savory, beefy, velvety stew but you end up with a watery broth full of tough chunks of beef? Yeah, me too, which is why I worked on this stew until it was exactly how I wanted it. I wanted a rich, savory, velvety sauce. I wanted beef I could cut with a spoon. This is it, people. This is that stew.
When Mr. Briar and I had only been dating for a few months we went to a fantastic restaurant in Portland called Little Bird. PS – if you are ever looking for a great restaurant in Portland, try Little Bird, it is so, so good. Not that you need to look hard for good restaurants in Portland, seriously. ANYWAY. I think it was actually Valentine’s day, and I ordered something called Pot Au Feu, which is a french beef stew and means something like pot on the fire. And it was A-MAZING. Being an Irish girl I am not a stranger to beef stew, and although I liked it I was never overly excited about it. THIS? This was something to be excited about. With a rich sauce and tender, fall apart beef and caramelized vegetables. This is what all stew strives to be. Right away I set out to try to replicate it at home.
Over the last few years I have tried recipes that were really good, but until I decided I wanted to share it on the blog I had never really tried to perfect it. So, three rounds later I finally have a stew that I am IN LOVE with. I don’t want to over sell it. But you should make this, like ASAP is all I’m saying. And don’t forget to have some crusty bread on hand to dip in all that sauce.
There are a few components of this stew that are important to note. One is the quantity of red wine. I have made recipes for stew that call for an entire bottle of wine, and although that is good, I think it becomes overpowering, and to be honest I would rather have that wine in my glass than in the stew. SOME wine makes this stew fantastic though. So 1 cup of wine to 3 cups of broth seems to be a pretty winning ratio. The rest of the bottle can be for drinking while you make and eat this stew. Also, don’t be tempted to just use a whole box of stock because stock comes in 4 cup boxes and what are you going to do with that extra cup? I know, that is how I think too. But it ends up being too much liquid, and the beef doesn’t cook right. Just trust me. 3 cups of stock, 1 cup of wine, OK?
Which brings us to the second component. TIME. We use beef chuck in this stew, which is a cheap and tough cut of beef. Do you know what turns this from tough chewy meat into tender perfection? TIME does that. Let me tell you a story about how wonderful time is. The first time I made this stew, I cooked if for a total of an hour and a half. The stew was good, but I was not happy with how tender (or not tender) the beef was. The second time, I cooked it for 2 and a half hours, and the beef was much more tender, but still not as tender as I would have liked. The third and final time I cooked this, it was for 2 hours and 45 minutes. And the beef was PERFECT. Cut it with a spoon perfect. Not mushy, not tough, perfect. So, please don’t be tempted to cut the time short on this, even though it smells amazing and you are starving. It is worth the wait. And it is EVEN BETTER the next day.
But here is a cool and sort of different thing: You don’t brown the beef beforehand! I know! I’m pretty sure that most of us are conditioned to think that you have to brown the beef ahead of time, but this is a little trick I learned from Americas Test Kitchen. Instead of browning the beef beforehand, you cook the stew uncovered and the beef that is sticking out of the stew will brown in the oven. The reason you brown meat is to develop flavor. Instead of doing that beforehand, you do it while the stew is cooking. You will notice that a brown “fond” (I’ve already told you how I feel about that word) develops on the side of the dutch oven – the brown bits that start to caramelize on the side of the pan. Normally you would be scrubbing these off when you wash the pot, but we don’t want that! There is so much flavor there, we want that IN the stew, not down the drain. So, when you take the pot out of the oven to add the potatoes and carrots, just use a spoon to scrape the brown bits off the side and back into the stew, where it belongs and will develop delicious flavor. Do it again when you remove the pot when the stew is done.
Last of all, there are a few vegetable tricks. The first thing is adding some carrots and potatoes to the stew, but only in the last hour. If you throw everything in there at once, the vegetables will be mush by the time the stew is done. Don’t do that! You just add them at in the last hour so that they are perfectly tender when the stew is finished. The other thing is that I like some nice, caramelized vegetables with my stew. The problem is that they don’t get that way IN the stew. So what we do is cook them OUTSIDE of the stew and use them as a topping. An amazing, flavorful, caramelized topping that just takes this stew from really good to AMAZING. I know I’m being dramatic, and, like, it’s just stew, but also I’m serious. The caramelized veggie topping is extra work (not that much) but it is worth it. I think it is my favorite part. I use pearl onions in the topping, although if you can find them cipollini onions are great too. They can be pretty difficult to find sometimes, so using frozen pearl onions is totally fine. And bonus, frozen pearl onions are already peeled!
So, this is obviously a Sunday dinner type of stew. This is a cook for the entire afternoon stew. It’s not a quick, middle of the week meal, but it is something that will nourish you on a cold day, fill your house with delicious smells and make everyone who eats it insanely happy. You are going to LOVE it.
Red Wine Beef Stew
Ingredients
- 2 ½ pounds beef chuck roast cut into one and a half inch chunks.
- 2 onions diced
- 3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- 2 cloves garlic pressed or finely minced
- 1 tablespoon fresh thyme
- 1 tablespoon fresh rosemary chopped
- 1-2 bay leaves
- 1 cup red wine such as syrah or zinfandel
- 3 cups beef stock
- 1/4 cup flour
- 1 yukon gold potato cut into 1 inch cubes
- 2 carrots cut into 1/2 inch coins
- kosher salt
- fresh ground black pepper
- chopped fresh parsley for garnish optional
For The Topping:
- 1 cup pearl onions or cipollini onions
- 2-3 carrots cut into 1 inch pieces
- 8 crimini mushrooms thickly sliced
- 2 slices of bacon cut into 1 inch lardons
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 325°F
- Heat 3 tablespoons of olive oil in a dutch oven over medium high heat. Add onions and season with kosher salt. Cook, stirring often, until golden brown, about 20 minutes.
- Add tomato paste and garlic, cook, stirring constantly for about 2 minutes, until rust colored.
- Add flour and stir, cooking for about 1 minute.
- Whisk in broth slowly, then wine.
- Add herbs and bay leaves and bring to a simmer, about 3 minutes.
- Stir in beef and return to a simmer.
- Transfer to oven and cook, uncovered for 1 hour and 45 minutes.
- Remove from oven and using a spoon, scrape down the brown bits that have formed on the side of the pot. Add the potatoes and carrots to the stew, stir and rearange meat so that it is on top of the vegetables and sticking out of the sauce as much as possible (this way it will brown in the oven)
- Return to oven and cook uncovered for another hour or until potatoes and carrots are tender.
- While stew is cooking, prepare topping.
- In a medium saute pan, add just enough water to cover the bottom of the pan.
- Add bacon pieces, cover pan and turn heat on to medium high. Bring to a boil.
- When water is boiling, remove lid and add pearl onions and carrots. Cook, stirring often, until water has evaporated.
- Add mushtrooms and season with just a little salt (remember, bacon is already salty!). Reduce heat to medium low.
- Cook, stirring often, until vegetables are nicely browned, 20-30 minutes. Depending on how much fat your bacon releases, you may need to add just a little olive oil to the pan to coat the vegetables.
- When stew is done, remove from oven, stir and again scrape browned bits from the sides into the stew. Taste stew and season with salt and pepper if needed.
- To serve, spoon stew into bowl and top with some vegetable topping and fresh parsley, if desired.
- Serve with bread (optional, but strongly advised).
Notes
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
If you like this recipe, don’t forget to PIN it! Follow me HERE on Pinterest for more great recipes.
I made this for my wedding anniversary and my husband and I both LOVED it! This recipe will definitely be a go-to for us. We’re making it again for New Year’s Eve! It’s rich and flavorful and the meat was perfectly tender.
I am so happy to hear that Erin!
This is the fifth time I’ve made this and it’s always delicious! I now have memorized it!! Thank you
Oh yay, so glad to hear that!
Outstanding. I was a bit concerned about all the hype on this recipe. Was not disappointed. A nice surprise that the seasoning is just right when the amount of added salt is almost nil. I trusted the prior comments and did not brown the meat ahead of time or add salt. Yikes! I did add a heaping T. of veal Demi glacé when I added the liquids to provide another component of flavor. Sauce started out very bitter, but has mellowed and melded beautifully. Left out potatoes as this stew is brilliant over a big plop of buttery mashed potatoes. Fresh green beans or broccoli on the side to cut the richness of this dish. Really, really fine recipe. Method is A+.
I’m so glad to hear that Sharon!
Made this stew last night and it was AMAZING! I didn’t have a dutch oven so I followed the suggestions of another commenter to adapt it to my electric pressure cooker.
I had a few issues with the pressure cooker. While i was still sauteing, it got pretty thick (maybe there’s a lower setting on saute? I’m not a regular cook). This made it very finicky about pressurizing, kept burning on the bottom, and I had to keep adding broth to it to get it to be liquid enough to reach the pressure cooking stage. It spent so long in the pressure building stage that I think the meat was half boiled by the time it began to pressure cook. After it was done, it was (of course) too watery, so I set it on simmer to reduce it. (I researched some thickening techniques but was a little gun shy on trying something new this late in the game).
Even with all of these foibles, the stew turned out so, so good.
One change I made which may have helped/hurt my pressure cooking experience was that I used chicken bone broth instead of beef broth. I knew i wanted a thick, rich gravy and figured the gelatin in bone broth would help.
All said, moral of the story is – use a dutch oven. (note to self, buy a dutch oven)
So happy you loved it! Yes, definitely try it with the dutch oven when you get one, you will love it even more!
This is my go to recipe when cooking a beed stew for my dad and grandma. Everyone loves it!
I am so happy to hear that Summer!!
This is the second time I’ve made this, and there is no better recipe out there. For those of you feeling compelled to brown the beef first, please don’t. As a lifelong searer, it was hard for me not to brown the meat first. However, the technique in this recipe browns the meat later and results in much more tender meat. And while we’ll all put our spin on some of the ingredients, I encourage you to follow the meat preparation to a tee. You’ll be glad.
Yay! Thanks so much for your comment Olivettio! SO glad you love the recipe.
Hi from the UK here! I’m planning to make this today as yes, seriously do not like watery gravy stew!
I was wondering 1. What are is gram measurements for the flour and millimetre measurements for the wine and stock? 2. I’m going to make dumplings with mine, when do you think I should add those?
So excited for this 😀
Hi Johanna – Yay! I hope you love it. Here is a conversion calculator for cups to millimeters that should make it easier for you: https://www.thecalculatorsite.com/cooking/cups-ml.php
For the dumplings, I haven’t tried it but usually with chicken and dumplings you cook the dumplings in the last 15-20 minutes, so that would be a good place to start.
Let me know how it turns out!
I’ve made this stew several times now and it does not disappoint. My husband isn’t a huge fan of red wine in stews or soups but he doe enjoy this recipe. It nice it doesn’t call for a whole bottle but just enough to get the flavor without overwhelming the whole dish. Do not skimp on the topping. I always just use regular onion diced and extra bacon. I always make a ton because I inevitably eat half of it before the stew is ready. I also just brown the meat before hand and add some parsnips.
So glad you love it Alison!
I’ve been making beef stew for 30+ years. I’ve posted and preached about beef stew. This is my favorite recipe. And I really thought my own recipe was awesome until now. Mine is a very similar but this version with simple ingredients is primeval in its flavor. So good, I must gush that it’s everything you want in a classic red wine beef stew You must make this stew! YOU MUST MAKE THIS STEW!
Wow, thank you so much Robert! I’m so glad you love it!
This was so good! I adapted it for my electric pressure cooker and was able to cut the total prep/cook time to about 1 hour 15 minutes. Here’s what I did, in case anyone else wants to try it.
For the pressure cooker times, I used the recommended times from the Weeknight Pot Roast recipe from America’s Test Kitchen’s Pressure Cooker Perfection cookbook, which uses sliced chuck roast.
I prepped all ingredients for both the stew and the topping, except the roast, which I left whole temporarily. I started the onions cooking on the sautee function of the slow cooker. While they cooked, I browned the roast since it wouldn’t be browning in the oven. I salted and peppered and rubbed flour on all sides of the roast, then browned it on all sides in olive oil in a hot pan on the stove. I used tongs to hold it up to brown the ends and skinny sides. After browning it, I cut it into 1.5″ chunks as directed and wiped out the pan so I could use it to make the topping.
When the onions were golden brown, I proceeded with the tomato paste, garlic, herbs, flour, broth, and wine (I used Zinfandel) as directed, still on the sautee function of the slow cooker. Once everything was incorporated, I added the chunks of meat, layered the potatoes and carrots on top (I doubled the amount of potatoes), sealed the lid on the pressure cooker, and set it for 30 minutes on high pressure. After the 30 minutes, I turned off the cooker and let the pressure release naturally for 15 minutes, then quick-released the remaining pressure.
While the stew cooked I made the topping as directed. I must admit I had mis-measured the flour, so the stew wasn’t as think as I would prefer. I mashed some of the potatoes into it and served it topped with a small dollop of sour cream, which thickened it slightly. It was delicious. Thank you so much for the recipe!
Hi Lisa! Thanks so much for sharing! I’m so glad you loved it!
Out of control. This recipe. Is. Out. Of. Control.
Wow. Extremely flavorful and very little salt–I didn’t make the topping.
I used a red wine called Freakshow. It’s a Cabernet Sauvignon. I dunno what that means I just know it was incredible.
This was so great, thank you.
Hi Sowande – Yay! I am so happy you loved it!
Hello I just wanted to say I made this stew today for my wife and kids and they loved it I doubled the recipe since we are a family of 6. The only thing different I did was add more potatoes and browned my meat first. Thanks for sharing can’t wait to cook it again.
So happy to hear that! Thanks Keith!
I was crushed when I could not find this recipe again.. when I made it was wonderful..sent it to a few friends and saved it.. the best i have ever made and i have made LOTS of red wine dishes as I live in the Napa Valley.. this is a lick the bowl or use the bread to clean the bowl recipe.. thanks I hate browning meat.. think this will work for pork as well>. with white wine.. and kraut.. oh I will try thanks
Hi Jan – I am so happy to hear that you loved it! It sounds like it would be great with pork too! If you want to make sure to stay in touch, be sure to sign up for my email list!
Oh my goodness… Hands down THE BEST beef stew I’ve ever had! It was so thick and flavourful. It was practically gravy. It reminds me of the rouladen that my dad makes for Christmas. Thanks for the recipe. I will definitely make this again and again!
Awesome Sam! I’m so happy you loved it!
I recently attempted a recipe that called for the wine/broth/water in equal parts (2 cups to be exact.) All I had on hand for red wine was CABERNET/MALBEC so would you have any opinions on this choice (i did not like the taste of the wine and found it overpowering.) Unfortunately, I’m new to wine in general and it was a gift and what I had available. While I realize that we all have our own personal taste preferences, I’m still wondering if I will feel differently to try again with your suggestions of syrah or zinfandel (and 1 cup at that.) ANY THOUGHTS?
Hi Sonia, I have made beef stew with more wine, but I felt that it was overpowering. That was why I used only 1 cup in this recipe. In general, it is always a good idea to cook with wine you like to drink. Cabernet tends to be more full bodied, so that might be why you found it overpowering. But often the taste really varies with different wines. I would love to know how it turns out for you!
Greetings from the UK!
Just made this stew for my wife and three boys and it’s DELICIOUS! The time spent was absolutely worth it – such a rich taste. Will be making this one again and again. Thanks so much for the recipe!
Steve Jones
Thank you so much Steve! I’m so happy to hear that you and your family loved it!
I made your stew today! It is amazing and I’m sure my husband will love it. Thanks so much for a great recipe!!
I’m so happy to hear that! Thanks Chris!
Hi i have some pre mixed spices rosemary thyme and sage is that ok? Id like to use what i have on hand what do u think ty cant wait to taste this ty
Hi Kristina, I haven’t tried it myself but I think it would be OK. Generally you should use 1 teaspoon of dried herbs in place of 1 TABLESPOON of fresh herbs. So adjust the measurements to teaspoons instead of tablespoons. I generally prefer the flavor of fresh herbs, but the dried ones should be fine in a pinch!
It was excellent! I do think the meat would do a tiny bit better with some browning before putting in the oven though, but the difference was so subtle, you may convinced me not to bother in the future so thanks!
For the vegetable topping instead I like to fry the bacon crispy, remove and then more finely chop the onion, mushrooms, and carrot before cooking in the fat until well-carmelized then toss in the stew, à la Julia Child. Letting those caramelized vegetables cook in the stew I think makes it even more delicious.
Yay! So happy that you enjoyed it! The topping you made sounds fantastic!
I want a recipe to use in a slow cooker. Are there any modifications I should make to adapt this to a crock pot. It sounds great.
Hi John, I haven’t made this one in the slow cooker, but if you want to do that I would start it on the stove top, then transfer everything to the slow cooker at step 8 when the directions say to transfer to the oven. I would also brown the meat, as in this recipe the meat browns in the oven. You may also want to check out this crock pot beef stew with beer recipe https://www.staging.foxandbriar.com/slow-cooker-beef-stew-with-beer/ that was tested for the slow cooker.