Lemon Thyme and Ginger

Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce

There are many Christmas Eve traditions in this country and the holiday menu is only one part of it. My childhood Christmas Eve dinner was traditionally a beef dinner. Mom would put together a simple but elegant meal of beef stew, rice or potatoes, a green vegetable, and salad. For dessert she made persimmon pudding with hard sauce. Mom steamed the persimmon cake in a clean repurposed coffee can. Why bother to buy another pan to bake one cake, when there was a perfectly useful container right at home?

One Christmas Eve stew I remember very well, is Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce. It is different from traditional American beef stew and beef bourguignon, but no less worthy of recognition. Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce had more pizzazz than American beef stew, not as rich as beef bourguignon. I can distinctly remember loving it upon first bite.

I get very nostalgic when I think about my childhood Christmas Eve celebrations. It has been a long time since I celebrated Christmas at 10 Barner Lane, but despite the years gone by, I can clearly visualize the evening. On Christmas Eve, Dad always wore his red plaid wool vest along with his blazer and plaid bow tie. Mom wore a long red wool skirt, white ruffled blouse with black embroidered trim, and a wide black belt. The rest of us wore our best clothes that were au courant for the season. For us “kids,” getting dressed up on Christmas Eve was never a chore, or formality. Putting on one’s “party clothes” symbolized a special occasion was here and we were going to celebrate.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

When dad was all finished dressing for the occasion, he would kneel by the dining room cabinet, reach inside to turn on the record player, place Joan Baez’s album Noël on the turntable, and turn the volume up. Her soprano voice would confidently but gently sing out, “O come, o come Emmanuel and ransom captive Israel … Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee Israel….” With the beginning notes of her enchanting voice the party began.

I would wait in the dining room for dad, anticipating his arrival and turning on the Christmas music. As soon as he was near the record player I would stand by his side and watch him turn on the “Victrola” as he called it. Next to the our tradition of singing Christmas Carols around a candle lit tree, playing Joan Baez’s album was one of my anticipated events of the evening. To me it signaled the beginning of our Christmas festivities and all the glory that was to come. Joan Baez’s clear voice filled our home for all to hear.

As Mom finished preparing the dinner in the kitchen, we built a fire in the fireplace, then Dad and I would sit on the couch in the living room, he with his wassail and I with my hot cider. We sipped and listened to Joan Baez sing, and waited for the rest of the family to gather and our guests to arrive. Dad was just as excited about Christmas Eve as I was. I could always count on Dad’s routines and traditions, as I could always count on him.

Mom acquired the beef stew recipe some time the in the 70’s and it has been a favorite of mine ever since. It has a simple name, Beef with Horseradish Sauce, but don’t let the simple name fool you. There are deep, subtle, and warm flavors in the stew. Hints of curry and ginger meld with the rich seared and oven stewed beef.  To add more subtle layers of flavor I added orange zest and cinnamon to infuse in the stew. I also wanted to coax out additional natural sweetness and added carrots and extra onions. The warm caramelized flavors of the spiced beef contrasted nicely with the tang of the sour cream and the bite of horseradish.

Helpful Hints Making Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce

To start the stew off, I recommend cutting the beef into three large pieces, sear the meat until golden brown, then cut the meat into smaller bite size chunks. This technique encourages the meat to sear properly and not steam in the pot. It is also a technique recommended by Serious Eats.  I found this method to be very effective and not a lot of extra work.

For the most part the stew will cook unattended in the oven, but you cannot forget about it. It is possible to overcook the meat in a stew despite the fact the beef is cooking in all that wonderful liquid. If cooked too long, the beef will get very dry and stringy. It is worth the extra effort to check on the progress of the stew meat after an hour and a half of cooking, then every 30 minutes thereafter. There is a possibility that the stew meat will reach the desired tenderness before the specified cooking time is up.

If you are making this stew a day or two ahead, you especially want to pay attention to the consistency of the stew. The additional cooking to heat the beef stew up again, for at least 30 minutes, will continue to cook and break down the beef. Stew should have discernible chunky tender pieces of beef that are just beginning to break down, not shredded and falling apart, as if for a pulled meat BBQ or a meat ragu.

I am unable to find the origin of Mom’s recipe. Most likely it was given to her from a friend, and from there is anybody’s guess. I have hopes that this mystery recipe will develop into its own identity and begin a new life with all of you. A new American stew. A hodgepodge stew of many possible origins, with each ingredient dependent on the other to accentuate its best features, and gel together into one big interesting and flavorful stew. Enjoy!

Print

Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce

Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce is a delicious stew with the subtle flavors of curry, fresh ginger, orange zest and cinnamon. The creamy tang of sour cream and bite of the horseradish compliments the beef and spices in the stew wonderfully. Not knowing the recipe's origin makes me believe this stew is an American adaption of flavors from Eastern Europe, India and the USA. Beef Stew with Horseradish Sauce now has a life of its own, as I have adapted the original recipe I received from mom years ago. Mom would make this stew for special occasions and parties. I fondly remember it as the main attraction for our Christmas Eve dinner.

Prep Time 30 minutes

Cook Time 3 hours

Total Time 3 hours 30 minutes

Servings 8 - 10 servings

Author Ginger

Ingredients

• 4 lbs/ ~2 kilos beef -chuck or top round beef
• 4 Tbs/60g butter divided
• 2 medium carrots washed peeled and cut in half both ways to get 4 big pieces per carrot
• 3 large onions divided
• 2 tea/~5g curry powder
• 1 inch/2.5mm piece of fresh ginger minced
• 2 Tb/ 30ml Worcestershire sauce
• 1 bay leaf
• 1 cinnamon Stick
• 3 pieces on orange zest about 2 inches long and 1/2 inch wide
• 1 tea Kosher salt
• 1/2 tea pepper
• 1 cup/250 ml chicken stock
• 1 cup/250ml dry white wine
• 1 cup/243g sour cream
• 2 Tb/308g prepared horseradish
• 2 Tb chopped fresh parsley

Instructions

1. Pre-heat the oven to 300 degrees F /150 degrees C/ Gas Mark 2
2. Cut the beef chuck into large steak like pieces. I had two pieces of beef chuck at 2.5 lbs each. I cut each piece into three large pieces.
3. Turn the stove up to medium high heat and melt 2 Tb of butter in a Dutch Oven. Sear the meat on both sides until golden brown. This will take several minutes on each side. Be patient and do not touch or move the beef around while it is searing. If you are using one pot you will need to brown the meat in two batches, adding the remaining 2 Tb of butter in the pot to sear the batch of meat. (See note)
4. Remove the seared meat from the Dutch oven and cut the seared beef into equal size pieces of around 1 1/2" to 2". Set the cut meat aside and reserve for later.
5. Cut 2 onions in half lengthwise then thinly slice the halves across the width. Saute the sliced onions in the Dutch oven with the rendered fat from searing the beef, until the onions begin to brown. Remove the sliced onions with a slotted spoon from the Dutch oven and reserve for later.
6. Cut the remaining onion into quarters and put in the Dutch oven. Add the carrots and brown the vegetables. About 5-8 minutes.
7. Add the minced ginger and curry powder and briefly cook for about 1 minute. Add the Worcestershire sauce, stock, white wine, orange zest, cinnamon stick, bay leaf and salt, pepper into the pot and stir to mix.
8. Add the beef chunks and any juices that accumulated in the pan, and heat the stew on the stove until it just begins to boil.
9. Cover the pot with a lid, very slightly ajar, and put into the preheated oven.
10. Cook the stew for an hour and a half. At that time check the meat to see its progress and remove the carrots and onions from the stew.
11. Add the reserved sauteed onions to the Dutch oven making sure to scrape out of the pan any accumulated juices. Stir to combine.
12. Put the stew back into the oven and continue to cook the stew in the oven and check for doneness every 30 minutes until the meat is tender, can easily be broken up with a fork, but still retains its shape. The beef is not completely falling apart. The original recipe called for 3 hour cooking time, but every oven is different so it is a good idea to monitor the progress to not cook the beef longer than necessary. My stew was done in 2 1/2 hours.
13. If you are making the stew ahead of time, I would recommend to stop cooking the stew by or before the 2 1/2 hour mark. You will cook the stew at a later time to heat it up and you do not want it to turn to mush. If reserving for later, Cool the stew down and put in the refrigerator, covered in the same pot, until you plan to reheat it.
14. Before serving mix the sour cream, horseradish and chopped parsley in a small bowl until just combined.
15. Before adding the horseradish sour cream, remove the orange peels, cinnamon stick and bay leaf from the pot.
16. Just before serving the beef stew, add the sour cream and horseradish to the stew and stir until well combined. You could also opt to serve the horseradish sauce as a condiment on the side. That way people can opt out of the sour cream if they want to, or add the amount of sour cream they desire.
17. Serve with buttered egg noodles, or boiled, buttered and herb red potatoes, along with a dark green vegetable like Brussels sprouts, broccoli or green beans.

Recipe Notes

I used two pans to sear the beef and divided the 4 lbs of beef and the 4 Tb of butter equally between each pan. I used a Dutch Oven and a cast iron skillet. It cut down on my cooking time significantly and if you can manage it, I recommend it. I then sauteed the sliced onions in the skillet and reserved them to add later into the stew.
I continued cooking the remaining steps in the Dutch oven.

© 2016 – 2018, Ginger Smith- Lemon Thyme and Ginger. All rights reserved.