Fantastic, Easy "Keeper" Beef Stew Recipe

Every now and then I come across a "keeper" recipe. One that immediately gets marked up, cut out and added to my "keeper" file to be used over and over again. This recipe, originally titled "Continental Beef" is in from the cookbook Don't Panic...Dinner's in the Freezer, by Susie Martinez, Vanda Howell and Bonnie Garcia, that I was introduced to on one of my teaching engagements. It, and other cookbooks that followed under the title, are cookbooks made for busy folks who use the cookbook to make really good food in quantity and freeze it for later use. Using the authors' many hints and suggestions you're basically making your own nutritious convenience foods but making them without chemicals, sodium, etc., found in grocery store convenience foods. I like that idea...a lot. It's so helpful on a really busy day when I have deadlines to just pull something from the freezer, defrost it and throw it in the oven or slow cooker!

I fiddle with recipes so I changed the Continental Beef one by adding some goodies and cutting back on others, so here is my rendition of the it, re-named Keeper Beef Stew. You can cook it in a cast iron Dutch oven, or, brown the meat, onions and mushrooms, then dump it all in the slow cooker and let it simmer for 8-10 hours. Or, if you're REALLY ambitious, prepare two of the dishes (brown the meat, etc.) and put the second recipe in a freezer bag and freeze. Bring the bag out and defrost in the frig, dump into the slow cooker on the day you want to have it and let it cook away.
But I guarantee your mouth will be watering all day as you smell the incredible aroma as it cooks!  So......good....over brown rice or noodles! The gravy is rich, and flavorful with the slow-cooked beef and vegetables. The onion melts into the juices and the beef just falls apart. Great on a cold winter evening with some rice or noodles, a salad and a glass of red wine!
Keeper Beef Stew

4-6 T butter
1 large onion, chopped
2 4-ounce cans mushrooms, drained (or 1 pound mushrooms, sliced)
4-6 carrots, peeled and cut into 1/2" to 3/4" pieces
2 1/2 pounds beef chuck, trimmed of fat and cut into cubes
1 15-ounce can tomato sauce
1 cup red wine
1 tablespoon granulated sugar
2 teaspoons Worchestershire sauce
2 teaspoons paprika
1 teaspoon sea salt
1/8 to 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder, or, 2 cloves garlic, minced

Putting it all together:
1. Melt 2 tablespoons butter in a large Dutch oven. Add mushrooms and onions; brown lightly and remove from pan and set aside.

2. Add 2 tablespoons more butter to same pot and add enough of the meat to just cover pan bottom; brown meat on all sides. Repeat with any remaining meat, adding more butter if necessary.
 
3. Dump meat, mushrooms and onions back into pan and add rest of ingredients; stir.

(At this point if you want to freeze it, cool first and then place into freezer bag and put into freezer.)

4. Cover and cook for about 2 1/2 hours in Dutch oven, or until the meat is very tender, stirring occasionally OR- dump it all into the crock pot and cook for 8-10 hours on low. Just make sure to get all of the good little browned bits out of the Dutch oven when you put it into the slow cooker! Doesn't this look yummy in the Dutch oven?

It tastes even better over rice with a glass of wine!