Whoa. Just, WHOA. I’ve never smelled anything as lovely and drool-inducing as this Slow Cooker Beef Stew. The incredible aroma had my mouth watering for hours as the tender chunks of beef and vegetables simmered away in the flavorful gravy. I couldn’t wait to lift the lid and take a quick taste. And when I finally did? INCREDIBLE. This crockpot beef stew recipe is one you’ll definitely want to make before winter is over!
Ingredients for Beef Stew
Beef stew, in its most basic form, is really simple. It’s just chunky pieces of beef, vegetables, broth, and some herbs and spices, all cooked down until it forms a delicious cozy gravy. But I took this beef stew recipe up a few notches with some extra special ingredients that add more umami and flavor to the stew gravy. The ingredient list may look long, but I promise it’s worth it. Here’s what you’ll need for the most incredible crockpot beef stew ever:
- Beef Stew Meat – Stew meat, which is usually cubed chuck steak, tends to be a tougher cut, but it softens to an extremely tender texture when cooked low and slow (like in a slow cooker).
- All-Purpose Flour – Lightly coating the stew meat in flour and then searing it before it goes into the slow cooker increases the Maillard reaction and deepens the flavor. The flour also helps thicken the stew’s gravy.
- Vegetables – We use a hearty and flavorful mix of carrots, onions, celery, and potatoes to create a naturally flavorful gravy. The vegetables also help thicken the gravy as they break down into the broth.
- Beef Broth – Broth acts as the base for the gravy and provides a nice moist environment for the meat to cook to tender perfection. Make sure to use a broth with great flavor. We like to use Better Than Bouillon to make our broth.
- Seasonings – This is where we really take the flavor to the next level. For this recipe, we combined garlic, Dijon, Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, brown sugar, rosemary, and thyme to make an over-the-top good gravy that is full of layered flavor and umami goodness.
How to Thicken Beef Stew
There are multiple ways to thicken a beef stew, but I prefer to allow the stew to thicken naturally as the vegetables cook and begin to break down into the broth. The stew may look a little watery when you first lift the lid, but once you begin to stir, the starches in the vegetables will begin to thicken the liquid into a gravy-like consistency.
Alternately, if you prefer a firmer vegetable, you can add them in the last hour of cooking and then use a cornstarch slurry (3 Tbsp cornstarch + 3 Tbsp water) to thicken your stew. Once the cornstarch is mixed into the broth and brought to a boil, it will thicken into a gravy. This method will result in a less flavorful gravy and a slightly glossy appearance.
What Else Can I add?
This slow cooker beef stew is pretty lush as is, but there are always options if you want to add more! Try adding 8 oz. mushrooms with the vegetables in the beginning (sliced in half) for more vegetable goodness. If you have some red wine on hand, deglaze the skillet used to brown the beef with the wine before proceeding with the gravy. Want it to look extra fancy? Sub 8 oz. pearl onions in place of the chopped onion in the recipe below.
Tips for the Best Beef Stew
- Sear the meat first. Browning the beef gives it an extra deep flavor that can’t be achieved in the moist environment of the slow cooker alone.
- Add extra umami. Adding ingredients to the broth that contain a lot of umami, like Worcestershire sauce and soy sauce, ramps up the flavor in the stew and makes the flavor extra “meaty”.
- Don’t rush it. Stew meat needs to cook low and slow for a long time in order for the tough connective tissues to break down and become tender. If your stew meat is tough, reduce the heat and cook it a little longer.
- Don’t skip the veggies. Including a variety of vegetables in your stew not only adds texture and color, but the vegetables also add a ton of extra flavor to the gravy, so you’ll get a delicious, multi-dimensional flavor in the final stew.
What To Serve with Beef Stew
This crockpot beef stew is a pretty well-rounded meal on its own, but you’ll want to sop up every drop of that deliciously thick brown gravy. I suggest serving your Slow Cooker Beef Stew with some bread on the side, like my Focaccia Rolls, or over a bowl of Creamy Polenta, warm rice, or egg noodles.
Love Beef Stew? You’ve got to try my Chicken Stew next!
Slow Cooker Beef Stew
Servings 8 1.25 cups eachIngredients
- 2 lbs. red potatoes ($2.40)
- 1 yellow onion ($0.37)
- 3 carrots ($0.44)
- 4 stalks celery ($0.44)
- 4 cloves garlic ($0.32)
- 1.5 lbs. beef stew meat ($11.24)
- 2 Tbsp all-purpose flour ($0.03)
- 1/4 tsp salt ($0.02)
- 1/4 tsp Freshly cracked black pepper ($0.02)
- 2 Tbsp cooking oil ($0.08)
- 2 cups beef broth ($0.27)
- 2 Tbsp Dijon mustard ($0.13)
- 1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce ($0.06)
- 1 Tbsp soy sauce ($0.06)
- 1.5 tsp brown sugar ($0.02)
- 1.5 tsp dried rosemary ($0.15)
- 1.5 tsp dried thyme ($0.15)
Instructions
- Dice the onion and red potatoes. Slice the carrots and celery. Mince the garlic. Place the prepared vegetables in a four or five quart slow cooker.
- Place the stew meat in a bowl and sprinkle the flour, salt, and pepper over top. Toss the meat until it's evenly coated in flour.
- Heat a large skillet over medium-high. Once very hot, add the cooking oil and swirl to coat the surface of the skillet. Add the stew meat and cook, without stirring, until browned on the bottom. Stir and then allow the beef to brown on a second side. Transfer the meat to the slow cooker.
- Turn the heat under the skillet down to medium-low. Add the broth, Dijon, Worcestershire sauce, soy sauce, brown sugar, rosemary, and thyme to the skillet. Stir and cook over medium-low until all the browned bits have dissolved off the bottom of the skillet.
- Pour the broth over the ingredients in the slow cooker and everything a good stir.
- Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook on high for four hours or low for eight hours.
- After cooking the meat and vegetables should both be tender. Stir the stew well to allow the potatoes to slightly break down and thicken the gravy. Taste the stew and adjust the salt or other seasonings to your liking. Serve hot!
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How to Make Slow Cooker Beef Stew – Step by Step Photos
Prepare the vegetables for the stew first. You’ll need to dice 2 lbs. red potatoes and one yellow onion, slice 4 stalks of celery and 3 carrots, and mince 4 cloves of garlic.
Place all of your chopped vegetables in a 4 or 5-quart slow cooker or crockpot.
Place 1.5 lbs. stew meat (beef chuck) in a bowl. Sprinkle 2 Tbsp all-purpose flour, ¼ tsp salt, and ¼ tsp pepper over the meat. Toss the beef until it’s evenly coated in flour, salt, and pepper.
Heat a large skillet over medium-high. When it’s very hot, add 2 Tbsp cooking oil and swirl to coat the surface of the skillet. Add the stew meat and let it cook until browned on the bottom, then stir and allow it to brown on the second side again. Do not stir often, or the beef will not have a chance to brown. Transfer the beef to the slow cooker.
Reduce the heat under the skillet to medium-low and add 2 cups beef broth, 2 Tbsp Dijon mustard, 1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce, 1 Tbsp soy sauce, 1.5 tsp brown sugar, 1.5 tsp dried rosemary, and 1.5 tsp thyme. Heat and stir the ingredients until all of the browned bits are dissolved off the bottom of the skillet.
Pour the broth over the ingredients in the slow cooker. It’s okay if the broth does not fully cover the ingredients in the slow cooker at this point.
Place the lid on the slow cooker and cook on high for four hours or low for eight hours.
After four hours on high (or eight hours on low) the stew should look a little like this. The meat and vegetables should both be tender. The gravy may look a little thin at this point, but don’t worry…
Give the stew a good stir and the potatoes will break down a bit and thicken the gravy into a nice rich consistency. Depending on the type of broth used, you may want to taste the stew and add salt to your liking (I did not add any).
Serve the Slow Cooker Beef Stew as is or spooned over a bowl of hot rice or pasta. THIS will keep you warm and full on cold winter days!
Great recipe but ads that autorefresh with sound are a huge turnoff! Went from being a lovely cooking experience to incredibly frustrating.
I have been making this recipe for 3 years now, and it never fails to be the best beef stew I have ever cooked or tasted! Thanks for sharing this recipe.
This is going to be the recipe that makes me buy a slow cooker. I do have one question – the Instant Pot recipe includes mushrooms and I would like to use them here also. Would it work to just add mushrooms along with the other veg? Thanks.
Yep! I’d just toss them in there with everything else. :)
It’s in the slow cooker as I’m writing this and smells abso Divine! I’ll let ya know how all my men (4) of em enjoy this hearty mea as well as me! Loving this concept so far! Maybe worried a bit about the amount of meat (3 lbs) and the amount (lotsa) veggies compared to liquid but I’ll add some beef broth maybe and thyme bay leaves and rosemary w it if I think too much and start to worry as it cooks down. Hoping lotsa moisture is added from veggies
can this be made in an instant?
Here is my Instant Pot Beef Stew recipe.
This was outstanding! I only had russet potatoes at home and my husband isn’t super keen on thyme so I omitted that but wow, this was so good. I cut the beef cubes in half and mixed them into the veg and juices and had no issues with the 4.5 hour cook time. And the house smelled amazing. Served it with garlic buns. Highly recommend for a snowy Canadian night when in need of a warm, easy, comforting meal.
I made this recipe for dinner and it was very good. I copied what someone had said about the vegetables being on top of the meat and mine came out great. Will be making it again.
I’ve made this in the slow cooker a bunch of times and recently made it on the stovetop in a Dutch oven — even easier since it made it a one-pot recipe. Browned the beef then threw the broth in to loosen up the stuck-on bits, then added everything else. Simmered for 3-4 hours with the lid on and the meat was already falling apart (in a good way). Thanks as always Beth!
Would this recipe/flavour set work with lamb/mutton instead of beef?
Probably, although I haven’t cooked lamb or mutton so I’m not familiar with any specific considerations needed for that type of meat.
I’ve made this with lamb several times (I haven’t made any changes to the above recipe) and I think it turns out pretty delicious!
Wow. This was incredible. My prep time was longer because I’m honestly a terrible cook. But seriously this was worth it. I’ll never make stew another way.
Trying to edit. I was giving it 5 stars
I love this recipe. The flavours are so good and it’s very easy and filling. One note because I didn’t see it written here and would like to prevent someone from making the same mistake: this did NOT freeze well :( the potatoes got all soggy and there was a ton of water at the top. I freeze a lot of Budget Bytes recipes, but this one just didn’t work. (It wasn’t recommended as a freezer recipe, so it was 100% my bad, just wanted to note!)
I add an extra cup of red wine, Italian seasoning, extra garlic, extra rosemary and fresh thyme. Golden potatoes instead of red potatoes, and added shallots. This is one of our favorite stews we love variations of it and are never disappointing! Thank you for posting!
Is there a way to do this in an instapot?
Here’s the IP version: Instant Pot Beef Stew
This turned out pretty good. I had more meat than what the recipe called for so I increased all the ingredients about 59% to match the meat quantity. I messed up a bit and added 4 cups of broth instead of 3 (2 × 1.59), but I think it didn’t matter much. I made it in a 8 quart instant pot on the slow cooker high setting for 4 hours, but it barely fit with being 59% more. I layered it so the potatoes were on the bottom, then carrots, celery, onions, and meat. I think browning the meat is a good idea and wouldn’t skip it, but I spent way more time than 30 minutes browning the meat and prepping the ingredients. The vegetables came out cooked all the way through, but not mushy and the celery/onions had a bit of crunch. If you prefer the vegetables to fall apart, you will probably need to cook it longer than 4 hours. The meat was at 200 degrees F at the end of cooking. The broth had a good, but somewhat subtle, flavor (probably made somewhat more subtle by the extra cup of liquid). The rosemary comes through well, but I would prefer more garlic flavor. We ended up with about 6 full meal servings (ie not served with anything else) and some of those will probably be frozen for later.
I will probably make this again, but I will probably add more garlic, less celery/onions, and more seasonings to match my preferences.
This recipe is definitely made to be cooked on low for 8-9 hours as opposed to on high for 4. Next time I will try the tip from Daniel Ptak re: the layering as I always put my hard vegetables on the bottom of the slow cooker and meat on top. I have never stirred the meat in with vegetables – ever – in a stew. That is meant for chilis or soups. No need to serve pasta or rice as this meal has enough carbs and is starchy enough as is with the potatoes. Very flavourful otherwise. :)