A rich Braised Beef with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes, where all the ingredients, including the tomatoes cook down and become this lovely thick sauce over the tender beef. It’s a great meal for company, or just to show your family you love them.

Braised Beef with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes | Life Currents

I know, this isn’t my normal recipe! It’s not vegetarian! Well, Dan does eat meat, and he loves beef. In fact, after eating this the first time he said, “I think I’ll become a cow-atarian”.

He loved it so much, it was part of our Christmas Eve Meal, and it’s a fairly healthy dish (if you eat meat), so I thought I’d share it. And, I admit, it smells fabulous while it cooks.

We first made this Braised Beef with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes for Christmas Eve Dinner. Dan asked if I would please make my Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes with Onions instead of simply buying jarred Sun-dried tomatoes.

Making the tomatoes isn’t much work, so that was a request I could go for, and I suspected he was right that the homemade ones would give more flavor to the dish. Basically, everything including the tomatoes cooks down and becomes this lovely thick sauce over the tender beef.

This really smells awesome while it cooks, even to this vegetarian. My husband loved it! And, he’s made it twice now, so it must be good!

The beef stew meat at my store is already cut into cubes, so it saves me some time. Look around for that, or if your store has a butcher, you can ask them for cubed stew meat. The recipe calls for 1-inch cubes. Really the most important part is that the cubes are roughly the same size, so they all cook at the same rate; the larger the cube, the longer the cooking time will be. I also like the idea of beef stew meat because it’s a relatively inexpensive cut of meat.

For the wine, we used Pinot Noir. It’s a nice dry neutral red wine, not overly heavy or sweet. It’s also the same wine that I used in the Lentils with Winter Veggies.

Braised Beef Stew with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes

When it comes time to simmer the beef, it simmers at a high simmer, or a low boil. It was a bit more activity than we expected, but each time it was the same. So, that’s normal, and just let it cook away. Dan loved it when it cooked for a little over 2 & 1/2 hours, so that it was so tender it was falling apart.

And, like several of my other recipes, I’ve written this one to use the dry ingredients first so your measuring spoons stay clean and dry until you need to get them wet.

Braised Beef Stew with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes | Life Currents

I’ve served the Braised Beef with a side of Mashed Potato Casserole. This Potato Casserole has a crunchy bread crumb and Asiago topping that’s super yummy. I’ll post this here.

Braised Beef with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes Recipe

Braised Beef with Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes

Debi

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Servings

Ingredients

¼ teaspoon garlic powder
½ tablespoon brown sugar
¾ teaspoon dried rosemary
½ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 bay leaf
½ tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 cup low-sodium vegetable broth
1 cup water
½ cup dry red wine
1 teaspoon olive oil
1 pound beef stew meat cut into 1-inch cubes
1 medium onion vertically sliced
1 cup Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes with onions or sun-dried tomato halves
½ tablespoon all-purpose flour
chopped chives for garnish

Instructions

In a medium bowl or a 4-cup Pyrex measuring dish, mix together first 10 ingredients (garlic powder through red wine). Set aside.
Heat olive oil in a large Dutch oven or heavy saucepan over medium-high heat. Working in batches so as not to crowd the pan, add cubed beef, cooking until well browned on all sides, about 10-20 minutes per batch. Remove beef from pan once it is browned.
In the same Dutch oven, add sliced onions to beef drippings, and cook until onions are caramelized, about 20 minutes, add in a couple tablespoons of water if the onions appear to be burning or cooking too quickly.
Once the onions are nice and caramelized, add browned beef back to the pot. Stir in the flour, and cook, stirring, for 2-3 minutes. Stir in broth mixture and Balsamic Roasted Tomatoes. Reduce heat to medium-low; cover and simmer 1 hour. Uncover and simmer 30-60 minutes or until beef is very tender. Discard bay leaf. Sprinkle each serving with chives.