Craig Claiborne's Beef Stew

This worked out very nicely for me. After reading through all the comments, I made the following changes to the base recipe:
* I used 3 cups of wine (cab sauv) and 1 cup of beef stock
* I let the alcohol burn off for quite a while (maybe 15+ mins)
* I roasted some mushrooms and added them when I added the water
* I cooked the whole thing about 30-60 mins longer than directed
* I added potatoes when there was 30 mins left
* I added some extra thyme at the very end
* I served with a nice bread.

So, basically a completely different recipe... ;)

Some differences of opinion here -- nothing wrong with that...

BUT... I'm amused that this recipe calls for 4 lbs. of meat cut in 2" chunks... and then put in A SINGLE LAYER in a pan that can later be covered. Good lord, how large is this pan? I used a monsterous 14" skillet (no lid...) and it STILL wasn't large enough. Me thinks that no one is proofing the writing here!

There's a cheat in this recipe: while the instructions calls for skillet (as in something akin to stroganoff), the photo featured in the article uses a dutch oven.

I strongly recommend doing this in a dutch oven, specifically with some air between liquid and the lid, so that the oven is at most 3/4th full (less is fine, but not more); in this way, the meat is much more flavourful.

A great starter stew! This is a recipe where exactness is *not* a requirement. Not enough wine around? Sub in stock. No stock? Water will do the job — less flavorfully, but the job will get done.

As others have said, it's critical to get the alcohol in the wine burned off. If the steam still smells strongly of wine, keep things at a boil until the alcoholic odor goes away.

Immediate go-tos for taking things up a notch include mushrooms, other root veggies, and dare I say perhaps prunes?

I've made this dish essentially as shown (in a dutch oven) many times and I have to laugh at all the variations to poor Craig's recipe. I'm sure he's laughing too at the Comedie Humane that is the NYT Food Section. Well, variety (more garlic, more thyme, less wine, more wine, less meat, more meat) is the spice...whatever floats your beef.

Keep the recipe as is with carrots etc. However, use equal parts dry red wine and vegetable stock. Try tossing the meat in a tub of flour that's been heavily mixed with smoked paprika so that the flour is pink in color and then browned. Finally preheat the oven to 300 then turn down to 275 and braise the stew in the oven. The slower cooking will take care of any toughness.

Julia Child's old rule "cook with wine you would drink" is less apt now (because there's less terrible wine out there). I usually use a Cotes du Rhone (which is a blend) Sangiovese or Merlot for something like this. A bottle of Two Buck Chuck or equivalent would be fine. I would never use a bottle costing more than about $6-7 for something like this, it's just wasteful.

I don't see how this is a good recipe - you have to change it so much you're better off following Julia Child's Beef Bourginon. Water instead of stock doesn't make sense and cloves are very strong so four seems like a lot;also if you were a novice cook following these instructions and tried to brown four pounds of cut up beef in one layer in a cast iron skillet you would have a giant mess. Something is off here.

Needs WAY more than 90 minutes simmering for the meat to tenderize. Ideally 3-3.5 hours.

Double or triple the garlic

This is a good starting point for a beef stew. I added about 2 cups of beef bullion (Better Than Bullion), did only 3 cups of red wine, added a dash of balsamic vinegar, along with potatoes, cooked on medium-low for about 3 hours 30 minutes. I added peas and fresh thyme at the end...was delicious and the meat was very tender. And it goes great with the crusty bread as Ann G recommends!

I halved this recipe and had great results, I used a cup of wine and some beef stock, otherwise I found it expensive to add 4 cups of wine, had I made the full recipe. I also added some potatoes near the end.. everyone loved it, even my 3 year old, would make it again. PS. I also cooked it about 45 minutes longer than suggested.

Instead of urging the cloves lose in the stew, I push them into a small unpeeled onion which is added whole to the stew after the liquids have been added.

I've read and tried many variants of this same recipe of meat in red wine, and here's what I think:

- Flour isn't necessary
- You can add nutmeg, juniper, cinnamon and cloves depending on how you want it. One more thing to consider is red currant or black current jam or jelly or whatever
- You can add mushrooms or black olives depending on how you want it, but not both
- Add wine, then add enough water or stock to cover it - if you have space, of course.