34 Warm and Comforting Beef Stew Recipes

Spanish Beef Stew With Vegetables — The Spruce/Diana Chistruga

Is there anything more comforting on a cold autumn or winter night than a warm and hearty bowlful of beef stew? Warm up your insides with our most scrumptious beef stew recipes that you can serve for a family or to welcome company.

8 Mistakes to Avoid When Making Beef Stew

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Old-Fashioned Slow Cooker Beef Stew

The Spruce

Use your slow cooker to make an old-fashioned beef stew just like mom used to do. Chunks of tender beef mingle with carrots and potatoes in a savory, well-seasoned broth of beef stock, onion, garlic, and simple seasonings. A touch of flour added at the end of cooking to thicken the stew.
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Easy French Beef Burgundy Stew

Joff Lee/Getty Images

Make French beef Burgundy (also called boeuf bourgignon) to impress dinner guests or treat your family to a special dinner. While other versions require all-day cooking, this genius recipe needs only 90 minutes to produce a deeply-flavored, well-seasoned, saucy, red wine-based beef stew.
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Slow-Cooker Cowboy Stew With Beef and Beans

bhofack2 / Getty Images

Saddle up for this easy, kid-pleasing cowboy stew that cooks all day long in your slow cooker and uses canned goods from the grocery store as clever shortcuts. Open up some pork and beans, and cream-style corn, adding them to the crockpot to simmer with cubes of stewing beef.
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Beef and Barley Stew

The Spruce / Julia Hartbeck

High-fiber beef and barley stew with mushrooms, turnips, carrots, peas, and potatoes makes a nutritious thermos lunch for kids on cold school days, or a satisfying brown-bag lunch for mom or dad. Make it on the stovetop, browning beef with bacon, before adding grains, vegetables, and seasonings.

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Crockpot Beef and Beer Stew

The Spruce

Beer adds great flavor to this hearty beef stew with potatoes, onion, garlic, carrots, and celery. Choose a beer you enjoy drinking to add to the crockpot, then go about your day, and come home to a filling one-pot meal.
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Chilean Beef Stew

Pablo Lobos Ovalle/Wikimedia Commons/CC BY-SA 4.0

Traditional Chilean beef stew uses dried beef to create its signature flavor. This tasty recipe recreates that dried beef-taste with beef jerky, which you cook along with stewing beef, diced acorn squash, carrots, potatoes, lima beans, and corn. Add spice with hot chile pepper paste and serve the Chilean way by topping with a fried egg.
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Beef Stew With Dumplings

vauvau/Flickr

Plump, doughy dumplings add pillowy texture to this wonderfully comforting crockpot ragout of beef with vegetables and dried herbs. Use a biscuit mix for the dumplings, dropping them by spoonfuls atop the long-simmered stew about half an hour before serving.
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Caribbean Beef Stew

The Spruce / Ahlam Raffii

Serve up some island flavor with this delicious Latin Caribbean carne guisada that hails from the Dominican Republic. Use a heavy Dutch oven for this stovetop braise, which cooks down cubed stewing beef with vegetables, olives, and capers, to create a gorgeously thick and aromatic meat stew.

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Instant Pot Beef Stew

Diana Rattray

Stews often require a major time investment, but that isn't the case with this delicious instant pot beef stew that is speedy enough to make on busy weeknights. Use the appliance's saute setting to brown the beef, then switch it over to stew mode, add vegetables, red wine, broth, and seasonings. In an hour, lift the lid, and enjoy your stew!
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Slow Cooker Barbecue Beer Beef Stew

The Spruce

Favorite cookout flavors add hearty appeal to this substantial-tasting, rich beef stew that makes an excellent game day offering. Barbecue sauce, beer, beef broth, honey, and mustard go into the slow cooker with chunks of stewing beef, parsnips, and onions.
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Argentinian Beef Stew

The Spruce Eats / Eric Kleinberg

Argentina is home to many cattle ranches and has built a unique cuisine around its meat. A great example is this unusual, yet delicious beef stew that includes dried fruits. Apricots, raisins, and sweet potatoes give the beefy braise a slightly sweet taste, with tomatoes, onions, and winter squash rounding out the complex flavor.
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Chili Beef Stew With Beans and Corn

Diana Rattray

Making chili with chunks of stewing beef instead of ground meat transforms it into more of a beef stew, but with all those chili flavors that you love. Serve up this saucy, spicy cook-up of beef, beans, corn, and green chile peppers as an easy family meal to eat in bowls in front of the TV, or enjoy it at tailgating events.

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Greek-Style Reddened Beef Stew

Foodcollection/Getty Images

Fresh tomatoes, tomato paste, and red wine add fantastic, deep flavor to this delectable, "reddened" beef cubes cooked in the Greek style. The dish includes an entire pound of onions, which simmer on the stovetop until they become soft and sweet, providing excellent balance for savory beef and tomatoes.
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Instant Pot Beef Bourguignon

Diana Rattray

One of France's most famous dishes, beef bourguignon becomes simple and quick when made in the Instant Pot. Bacon, onion, and beef are browned on the saute setting, and then the rest of the ingredients are added and pressure cooked until thick. Red wine, beef stock, and fresh herbs create a rich sauce, wonderful served over noodles, mashed potatoes, or rice.
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Crockpot Apple Cider Beef Stew

Bill Boch / Getty Images

Apple cider and fresh chopped apples add sweetness to a simple, kid-pleasing beef and potato stew. Use your slow cooker, or a Dutch oven on your stovetop, to make this easy recipe that needs fewer than 10 ingredients, and is sure to become a family favorite.
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Traditional British Beef Stew and Suet Dumplings

The Spruce

In the United Kingdom, where winters can be long and bitterly cold, this time-honored beef stew has helped many a Brit keep their spirits up until spring. From the rich sauce made with dark beef stock and brandy to the traditional suet dumplings that employ beef fat, there is really nothing like it on dark winter days.

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Cuban Beef Stew

The Spruce / Diana Chistruga

Beef stew meets pulled pork in this Cuban-inspired recipe that pairs tender shredded beef with classic stew ingredients. Take the extra step to simmer the meat with aromatics first, before adding it to a sherry-spiked mixture of tomatoes and other vegetables, with cumin and Bay leaves for flavoring.
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Chinese Daikon, Carrot, and Tomato Beef Stew

Liv Wan

Cook up a dinner with a difference when you add daikon radish and Asian-style flavorings to cubed beef flank. The stew is tangy, tasty, and beautifully balanced in its flavors, with soy sauce, rice wine, star anise, and cinnamon adding depth and sweetness to tender meat, tomatoes, and radishes.
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Country Style Beef Stew

Cavan Images / Getty Images

Rustle up a country-style beef stew with this easy recipe that delivers plenty of rich, beefy flavor. Make it in a Dutch oven, or a tall-sided heavy skillet, browning beef before adding herbs, vegetables, and liquids. Leave to simmer up to two hours, adding a bit of cornstarch at the end of cooking, for a thicker sauce.
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Slow Cooker Sweet Potato and Beef Stew

Nadine Greeff / Stocksy

Sweet potatoes and ground cinnamon add fantastic, autumnal flavor to a classic beef stew. The ingredients cook slowly all day in the crockpot, creating a rich sauce for ultra-tender meat and veggies, as they fill your kitchen with mouth-watering aromas.

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Beef and Guinness Stew

The Spruce

Guinness Stout adds its characteristic dark, bittersweet taste to this rib-sticking stovetop stew of beef and root vegetables, with a hint of bacon flavor. Add potatoes and thyme near the end of the two-hour simmering time, so they become tender and infused with beefy flavor, but not grainy or overcooked.
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Easy Crock Pot Beef and Mushroom Stew

StockFood/Getty Images

If you love meatloaf with mushroom sauce, this creamy crockpot beef and mushroom stew is for you The luscious sauce is made with plenty of fresh sliced mushrooms, plus four cans of condensed cream of mushroom soup, which mingle in the slow cooker with beef chuck, garlic, and herbs.
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Perfect Slow Cooker Beef Stew

The Spruce

Some red wine is added to the beef broth in this classic slow cooker beef stew, for a touch of robust French flavor, but you could use apple juice instead, or skip it entirely. This is a hearty, satisfying stew, with plenty of meat, along with button mushrooms, pearl onions, and carrots, plus crispy bacon for good measure.
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Catalan Beef Stew

Westbury/Getty Images

Catalan beef stew has a secret ingredient - chocolate! It may sound unusual, but a little bit of chocolate and cinnamon, plus a full glass of red wine, doesn't add sweetness, but instead gives rich body to this delectable beef and vegetable stew.

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Anglo-Indian Beef Stew

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This hearty mash-up of Indian, Western, and Asian flavors is fusion comfort food at its best. The ingredient list may look long, but it's actually easy to cook this recipe once you assemble the ingredients, and the resulting flavor is out of this world. It's loaded with healthful veggies, too.
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Bavarian Hunter's Beef Stew

Michelle Arnold/EyeEm/Getty Images

You don't have to be a Bavarian hunter to love this substantial stew. Simmer hearty chunks of meat with mushrooms, potatoes, and carrots in a rich sauce made with dry red wine and dark beef stock, cooking down the beef and veggies until they become yielding and soft, and the liquids have thickened.
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Spanish Beef Stew With Vegetables

The Spruce/Diana Chistruga

Popular Spanish ingredients, including sweet green and red peppers, and smoky Spanish paprika, add to the flavor of a classic, tomato-based beef stew with potatoes. Make it on the stovetop, or follow the tips for using a pressure cooker to reduce cooking time to about 20 minutes.
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Slow Cooker Sweet and Sour Beef Stew

Westend61/Getty Images

If you love sweet and sour meatballs, you will adore this sweet and tangy slow cooker beef stew. Start by browning flour-dusted cubes of beef in a little hot oil, before adding them to the slow cooker with carrots, onions, brown sugar, vinegar, and Worcestershire sauce, and leave to cook all day. Makes an excellent freezer meal to heat on busy weeknights.

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Beef, Leek, and Mushroom Stew

The Spruce / Diana Chistruga

Wondering if you can serve beef stew for dinner parties? Meet your new, go-to recipe for when company calls. Leeks, shallots, baby button mushrooms, and dry red wine are elegant ingredients that make this braised beef dish a delight to serve. Ladle over mashed cauliflower or garlicky mashed potatoes.
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Family-Style Crock Pot Beef Stew

Cameron Whitman / Stocksy

The slow cooker makes preparing this family-style beef stew with potatoes, carrots, and canned stewed tomatoes a breeze. Searing the beef on the stovetop before adding it to the crockpot adds rich, caramelized flavor to the meat. But you can skip this step if you don't have time.
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Flemish Beef Stew

Stuart West/Dorling Kindersley/Getty Images

Flemish beef stew is the national dish of Belgium and tastes special enough to serve to company. Cook it in under two hours in a heavy pot on the stovetop, adding a full bottle of Belgian ale to make a delicious sauce for cubes of stewing beef, along with apple cider vinegar, onions, garlic, dried spices, and a little brown sugar.
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Slow Cooker Mexican Beef Stew

ALLEKO / Getty Images

Wow guests at a Mexican-themed fiesta by serving up a big pot of this well-flavored beef stew. The beef cooks in a delicious red chile broth, flavored with onions, garlic, bay leaves, thyme, cumin, and oregano. Serve in bowls topped with chopped fresh cilantro, plus crumbled tortilla chips if you like, and lime wedges for squeezing.

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Crockpot Beef Stew With Onion Soup Mix

The Spruce

This easy crockpot beef stew gets fabulous flavor from beefy onion soup mix and tomatoes. Potatoes, carrots, and canned tomatoes add great taste and texture to this nutritious stew that makes a great thermos lunch for kids, or a hearty weeknight family meal with biscuits or crusty rolls.
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Easy Crock Pot Beef Curry Stew

David Marsden / Getty Images

Curry powder and some Creole seasoning flavor this aromatic beef stew with tomatoes, garlic, and small white onions. Take 5 minutes to brown the beef and onions first, before tossing them into the crockpot with other ingredients, and leaving to cook all day. Serve atop bowls of of basmati rice.

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