If you choose wisely, there’s a wealth of information on the internet for the home cook searching for recipes or ideas.  I refer to it all the time.  Several of my favorite sites include Food 52, Chef Steps and Serious Eats.  Their recipes are fully tested to be virtually foolproof, and at Chef Steps they offer instructional videos that are extremely helpful.

One that caught my attention recently was the recipe for beef stew from Serious Eats. It turned out to be the essence of heartiness, a perfect beef stew.   Several components, however, of the dish are unusual—certainly different from the typical methods used for this simple preparation.

All-American Beef Stew adapted from Serious Eats

All-American Beef Stew adapted from Serious Eats

I made the dish over the weekend and it was indeed an All-American Beef Stew.    One step was to mix one quart of chicken stock with four envelopes of plain gelatin, a few anchovies and several tablespoons of tomato paste.  These are all mixed in a blender until fully emulsified; it forms the basis of the cooking liquor in which the stew braises.  The gelatin adds texture and body.

Another step involves how you prepare the beef.  It calls for using a rolled boneless chuck roast of about 3 pounds.  I bought the roast from Bisson’s in Topsham, but Pat’s Meat Market, Rosemont, The Farm Stand and Whole Foods generally have these roasts.  You’ll pay more for it at Rosemont and Farm Stand because they sell meats that are farm raised locally as pastured, organic beef.  The Bisson’s meat is from their farm too but costs far less than the organic variety.  You then deconstruct the rolled roast by untying it and cutting it into 3 or 4 steaks.  These are browned in a large Dutch oven in preparation for the braising.  After browning and allowed rest, they are then cut into large cubes of about 2 inches each when set to cook with the aromatics and stock.

The finished stew straight from the oven

The finished stew straight from the oven

When I make this again I would make a few minor changes.  The recipe suggests using either fresh or frozen pearl onions; I used frozen.  Next time I’d make the effort to prepare small white boiling onions (larger than tiny pearl onions) for the stew.  The pearl onions got lost in the recipe because they’re so small and I’d rather have onions cooked fresh in the last hour of braising.  I’d also cut the carrots into larger chunks—both of these ingredient in larger dice and size make for a nicer  presentation where you see the trio of vegetables better—potatoes, carrots and onions—in the finished dish.  The aromatics also include mushrooms; these add flavor but don’t make a visual statement.

The recipe also calls for braising it in a slow 275-degree oven in a partially covered Dutch oven.  Usually you cook these braised dishes in a closed pot; with the pot partially covered it helps to reduce the liquid in the braise. Just set the pot cover to allow about an inch open to the oven heat.  Also, the meat should be at a constant slow simmer: I first brought it to the simmer on the stove top and put in the oven to cook– raising the temperature to just under 300 degrees to maintain a constant slow simmer.

Note that the recipe calls for adding frozen peas at the end.  As you’ll see in the first photo, they’re not shown because I forgot to add the peas.  When I reheated the leftovers the next day  the peas were included.

Here is my adaptation of All-American Beef Stew by J. Kenzilópez-Alt of Serious Eats and author of the terrific cookbook, “The Food Lab.”