Nowadays I don’t cook soups or stews very often and to think of it, I don’t even know why, because when I was a child, a stew or a soup would be an everyday lunch meal with our family.

This beef stew is my mom’s favourite. It’s hearty, it’s healthy and it’s chock full of veggies us kids would rather not eat in any other form, like rutabaga and celery. But in this awesome beef stew? We would totally inhale it.

It takes a bit of time and effort to make this stew, with all the prepping and the veggie chopping, so my mom usually made like a gallon of it. It’s even better on the next day, with all the flavors blended in and the meat extra tender.

There are two ways of cooking this, one, you first fry the meat in oil and then stew it. Personally, I think this creates more flavor. But if you need a leaner version of this stew, ditch the oil and use water only. I would recommend adding more herbs in this case, like garlic and various dried green stuff, maybe parsley and oregano.

The stew will still be very filling and nice. But also very good if you’re sticking to a low fat diet as well. I hope you have fun with this recipe!