Beef stew with dumplings
Slow-simmered beef and root vegetables are finished with fluffy suet dumplings.
- Prep
- 20 min
- Cook
- 150 min
- Serves
- 4
- Level
- Easy
Gather
Ingredients
- 700 gstewing beef, cut into 3 cm chunks
- 1 tbspvegetable oil
- 1onion, chopped
- 3carrots, cut into thick slices
- 2 tbspplain flour
- 750 mlbeef stock
- 1 tbsptomato purée
- 1 tspdried thyme
- 150 gself-raising flour
- 75 gshredded suet
- 90 mlcold water, plus extra if needed
- salt and black pepper, to taste
Make
Method
- 1.
Heat the oil in a large, heavy-based casserole. Brown the beef in two batches, then lift it onto a plate.
10 minutes - 2.
Add the onion and carrots to the casserole and cook for 5 minutes. Stir in the plain flour and tomato purée, then gradually stir in the stock.
5 minutes - 3.
Return the beef and its juices to the pot and add the thyme. Bring to a simmer, cover and cook very gently for about 1 hour 50 minutes until tender, stirring occasionally and adding a splash of water if needed.
110 minutes - 4.
Near the end of simmering, mix the self-raising flour, suet and a little salt and pepper. Stir in enough cold water to make a soft dough and shape into eight dumplings.
- 5.
Season the stew and check there is enough gravy to surround the dumplings, adding a little water if necessary. Place the dumplings on top with space between them.
- 6.
Cover and simmer gently for 25 minutes without lifting the lid, until the dumplings are risen and cooked through.
25 minutes