Dutch Oven Beef Stew
Cubed beef, root vegetables, and red wine, cooked slow in a cast iron pot over coals.
- calories
- 620
- weight
- 18 oz
- cal / oz
- 34
- protein
- 52 g
- serves
- 4, scales
- prep
- 30 min
- cook
- 180 min
- total time
- 210 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Dutch oven
- Campfire coals
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- Winter / snow
- Dairy free
- Nut free
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Needs a cooler
- Actual cooking
Ingredients
| Beef rump or chuck | 2 lb | trimmed, cut into 1-inch cubes at home |
|---|---|---|
| Beef broth | 1 quart | carton, no fridge needed until opened |
| Potatoes | 1 lb | waxy, they hold their shape |
| Red wine | 1 cup | |
| Frozen peas | 2 oz | they thaw in the cooler and that is fine |
| Leek | 1 stalk | sliced thin |
| Celery root | 1/4 of a bulb | peeled, diced small |
| Carrots | 2 | sliced into coins |
| Red onion | 1 | rough chopped |
| Garlic | 3 cloves | |
| Tomato paste | 1 tbsp | tube travels better than a can |
| Worcestershire sauce | 1 tbsp | |
| Bay leaves | 2 | |
| Dried thyme | 1 tsp | |
| Oil | 1 tbsp | |
| Sea salt | 2 tsp | |
| Cracked pepper | 1 tsp |
Method
- Build a fire and let it burn down to coals. You want a steady medium heat under the oven, roughly the output of a bed you can hold a hand over for four seconds.
- Set the dutch oven on the coals with the oil. Brown the beef in two batches. Crowding the pot steams the meat and you lose the crust that makes the broth taste like anything.
- Pull the beef out. Add onion, leek, carrot, celery root, and garlic. Stir until the onion goes soft, about five minutes.
- Stir in the tomato paste and cook it another minute, until it darkens.
- Pour in the wine and scrape the bottom of the pot until nothing is stuck.
- Return the beef with the broth, Worcestershire, bay, thyme, salt, and pepper. Lid on.
- Rake most of the coals off to the side and put a dozen on the lid. Hold it at a bare simmer for two hours. Check every half hour and shuffle coals as needed.
- Add the potatoes. Another 30 to 40 minutes, until a knife goes through without pressure.
- Stir in the peas at the very end and give them five minutes off the heat. Fish out the bay leaves.
Three hours over coals is the whole point. Rump and chuck are full of connective tissue that only turns to gelatin with long, low heat, and that gelatin is what gives the broth body without any flour. Rush it at high heat and the meat tightens into cubes of rope.
The timing of the vegetables matters more than the recipe suggests. Onion, carrot, and celery root go in early because they are there for flavor and can afford to fall apart. Potatoes go in near the end so they stay potatoes. Peas go in off the heat, because anything more than a few minutes turns them grey. This is a cooler meal, not a pack meal: the raw beef and the weight of a cast iron pot both keep it at the trailhead.
Packing
Cube the beef, chop the onion, carrot, celery root, and leek at home and bag them separately. Beef goes in the cooler on ice, vegetables above it. Measure the thyme, salt, and pepper into one small jar. Wine travels in a plastic flask, not glass.
Variations
- No wine, or the kids are along: swap in another cup of broth plus a splash of red wine vinegar for the acid.
- A quarter cup of pearl barley in with the potatoes thickens the broth into something closer to a gravy.
- Left over the next morning, it reheats into a hash with eggs cracked on top.
https://petromax.de/blogs/bbqpit/beef-stew-aus-dem-dutch-oven