‘Tis the season for crock-potting! (Is that a real verb?) I wanted to share one of my favorite winter-time meals – a rich and hearty beef stew that’s made in the slow cooker.  On cold, snowy, miserable winter days, there just isn’t anything that will cheer you up like the smell of beef stew waiting to be enjoyed when you get home from work.

Ingredients:

Potatoes (3)

Carrots (4)

Garlic (1-2 cloves)

onion (1)

beef broth (2 cups)

red wine

~2 lbs stew meat

Flour

Worcestershire sauce

1 bay leaf

1 tsp paprika

salt and pepper

Steps:

1) Prep all your vegetables.  Peel and cut carrots, wash and cube potatoes, dice onion and mince garlic.

2) Put 1/4 cup of flour in a large plastic ziploc bag along with 1/2 tsp each of S&P.  Cube stew meat and place in bag. Shake well to coat with flour.

3) Heat up a skillet and brown the beef well.

4) Put the browned meat into the crock pot.  With the pan still on the heat, pour in approximately 1/4 cup of red wine into the skillet to get those yummy brown bits off of the pan.  Pour wine and brown bits into crock pot on top of the beef.

5) Add 2 cups of beef broth, 1 tsp paprika, 1 bay leaf, about 1 tbs of Worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper, and the vegetables to the crock pot.

6) Set the crock pot on high for 4-6 hours or low for 10-12 hours.

7) Enjoy!