Beef and Guinness stew

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• serves

  4

• prep

  5 minutes

• cook

  1:35 hour

• difficulty

  Mid

Ingredients

500g beef

250g flour

2 onions

1 clove garlic

1 tbsp clarified butter

Salt and pepper

1/2 litre Guinness

1 bay leaf

250g floury potatoes

250g floury potatoes, peeled and cooked

1 heaped tsp baking powder

75ml buttermilk

3 tbsp snipped chives

60g soft butter

Flour, for kneading and shaping

1 head broccoli

Instructions

For the stew, peel and slice the onions and peel and halve the garlic. Dice the meat, put into a bowl and mix with 1 tbsp flour. Heat the clarified butter in a flameproof casserole dish and brown the meat on all sides. Season with salt and pepper. Add the onions, garlic, Guinness and bay leaf and bring to the boil. Then cover and cook in a preheated oven (160°C) for 90 minutes.

For the Irish dumplings (Boxty) grate the raw potatoes and squeeze out well, catching the juice in a bowl. Leave to stand until the potato starch has settled to the bottom of the bowl.

Put the squeezed-out potatoes into a bowl and press the cooked potatoes through a potato ricer on to the raw potatoes (it will stop the raw potatoes going brown).

Mix the rest of the flour with the baking powder and add to the potatoes. When the potato starch has settled out, pour off the liquid and add the starch to the potato and flour mixture. Stir in the buttermilk and 2 tbsp snipped chives, season with salt and pepper and knead in 35g butter. Knead the dough lightly on a floured surface, shape into slightly flat dumplings and leave to stand for about 10 minutes.

Place the dumplings on top of the stew 30 minutes before the end of cooking time.

Meanwhile trim and wash the broccoli and divide into florets. Cook in plenty of boiling, salted water for about 3 minutes, then drain and refresh in cold water. About 8 minutes before serving heat the rest of the butter (approx. 20 g) in a frying pan and reheat the broccoli in the butter over a low to medium heat. Season with salt and pepper.

Dish the Guinness stew on to plates with the dumplings and broccoli and serve sprinkled with the rest of the chives.

Cook's Notes

Oven temperatures are for conventional; if using fan-forced (convection), reduce the temperature by 20˚C. | We use Australian tablespoons and cups: 1 teaspoon equals 5 ml; 1 tablespoon equals 20 ml; 1 cup equals 250 ml. | All herbs are fresh (unless specified) and cups are lightly packed. | All vegetables are medium size and peeled, unless specified. | All eggs are 55-60 g, unless specified.