Video:How to Make Crockpot Autumn Vegetable Beef Stew

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Transcript:How to Make Crockpot Autumn Vegetable Beef Stew

Hi, I'm Professional Chef Kara Mickelson, owner and founder of Creative Culinary Group. Today, I'm here with About.com and I'm going to show you how to make crockpot autumn vegetable beef stew.

Ingredients for Crockpot Autumn Vegetable Beef Stew

For this recipe you're going to have:

• 1 to 1 ½ pounds of stewing beef, and you're going to cut that into 2 inch sized cubes
• 1 slice of bacon, chopped
• 1 cup of onions, chopped medium
• 2 medium carrots, peeled and rough cut
• 1 fennel bulb, rough cut
• 3 or 4 large spring onions
• 1-4 stalks of celery
• 1 ½ pounds of potatoes, quartered
• 1 ½ cups of turnips, quartered
• 1 tablespoon of fresh, chopped parsley
• 1 bay leaf
• 2-3 cups of mushroom broth
• 2 cups of beef broth
• 1 cup of apple cider
• ½ a teaspoon of fresh rosemary, chopped
• 2 tablespoons of all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons of cold water
• 1/8 teaspoon of black pepper; and salt to taste

Instructions for Making Crockpot Autumn Vegetable Beef Stew

First we're going to add our bacon to a hot skillet. We're going to cook it on medium high heat until it's lightly browned. Next we're going to add the beef cubes, and season with salt. Next we're going to add the onions, and cook over medium heat until the beef is brown and the bacon is cooked. Searing the meat is going to add to the flavor profile of the stew.

Adding Ingredients to the Crockpot for Autumn Vegetable Beef Stew

Now that that's cooked we're just going to add everything to the crockpot. First we're going to add our meat, bacon and onions. Next we're going to add in the fennel, the celery and the carrots. In goes the quartered potatoes, the turnips, our fresh herbs, some bay leaf, our mushroom stock, the beef broth, apple cider. Now that we have everything in our slow cooker we're just going to add the cover and we're going to put on the power and we're going to cook everything for 7-9 hours on low heat. So our stew has about 1 hour left to finish cooking and now is a good time to add in those left over vegetables, and this will enhance the final presentation. So they'll just cook for a final hour, we're going to add those in, put the lid back on, and revisit it in an hour.

Now that the stew is finished cooking, we want to thicken up the base. So we're going to make a slurry. So I'm going to use two tablespoons of flour and then we're going to slowly mix in 2 tablespoons of water while we're stirring. And then this way, the flour won't ball up and turn into just a big lump in the soup. And this is how we're going to thicken the stew base, just make sure you get all the flour and you don't want to have any lumps. So now that our stew is completely cooked we're going to thicken up the stew base and we're just going to add that slurry in that we made a couple of minutes ago. And you just want to get in there and stir it, mix it all in really nice, and then were going to go ahead and let that cook with the lid on for another 15 minutes. So I'm just going to add a little pepper to our final presentation. And so there you have it - our autumn crockpot stew.

So thanks for watching. And if you would like to learn more, follow us on the web at About.com.