Slow Cooker Beef Stew and Dumplings
This rich-flavored beef stew is complemented with homemade fluffy herb dumplings. The stew slow cooks until everything’s tender, then the dumplings go in later. Enjoy it with crusty bread on the side to mop up all the wonderful juices.
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 8 - 10 hours
- Total Time: 10 hours
- Yield: 8 1x
- Category: stew, main course
- Method: slow cooker
Ingredients
Scale
- 2 pounds (900g) top round steak or lean stew beef, in 1-inch (2 ½ cm) pieces
- 2 celery ribs, sliced
- 4 carrots in ½-inch (1 ¼ cm) slices
- 2 onions, sliced
- ¼ cup (60ml) water
- ¼ cup (30g) all purpose flour
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
- 1 teaspoon dried thyme
- 1 teaspoon dry mustard
- 1 ½ teaspoons salt
- ¾ cup (185ml) beef broth (beef stock) or dry red wine, or some of each
- 8 sliced button mushrooms
- 14 ½ oz (400g) can diced tomatoes with juice
For the Herb Dumplings
- ½ cup (125ml) milk
- 1 ½ cups (180g) Bisquick
- ¼ teaspoon dried sage, crumbled
- ¼ teaspoon dried rosemary, crumbled
- ½ teaspoon dried thyme
Instructions
- Combine the beef, celery, carrots, onions, tomatoes, thyme, pepper, mustard, mushrooms, and wine or beef broth.
- If you are using wine, use all the salt.
- If you are using beef broth you might not need it depending on the saltiness of the broth so taste it to see.
- Cover and cook on a low heat for 8 to 10 hours or a high heat for 4 or 5 hours.
- The vegetables and beef will become tender.
- Combine the flour and water and stir this slowly into the beef stew.
- Combine the Bisquick, thyme, sage and rosemary and stir in the milk until the mixture is just moistened.
- Drop spoonfuls of the dough on to the hot beef stew, then cover and cook on high for 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the herb dumplings comes out clean.
Notes
This is quite an aromatic Crockpot beef stew, thanks to the thyme, mustard, wine and of course the herbs in the dumplings. It’s also fortified with mushrooms for an earthy flavor and the beef broth and/or red wine gives it a wonderful richness, bringing out the flavor of the meat. You’ll find it a very simple recipe, considering how great it tastes. Mine took about 10 hours to cook on a low heat, so start it early to ensure it’s ready by dinnertime.
Keywords: stew, beef, slow cooker