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Beef Stew Recipe for 3 quart Slow Cooker

3 quart slow cooker beef stew recipe

I enjoy a nice, hot bowl of stew when it’s cold outside. Making your own beef stew is easy, cheap, and most importantly delicious.

Unfortunately for me, I only have a 3 quart slow cooker (Crock-Pot 3-Quart Manual Slow Cooker, Stainless Steel). The good: the slow cooker was free. The bad: most slow cooker recipes are for 6 quart slow cookers. After some experimentation, I’ve come up with a beef stew recipe I really enjoy for my 3 quart slow cooker. Note: If you have a 6 quart slow cooker, you can double all the ingredients.

The recipe makes about 3-4 servings. I like to serve it with some warm, crusty bread, like a warmed baguette.

Ingredients

  • 1 lb beef stew meat, cut in to 1 inch cubes (My grocery store sells 1 pound packs of beef stew meat already cut in to 1 inch cubes.)
  • 1 large potato, diced
  • 1⁄2 pound of baby carrots, cut in half crosswise
  • 1 stalk celery, chopped (I buy the pre-washed, pre-cut celery sticks and chop them up. I use about 5-6 celery sticks.)
  • 1⁄2 onion (large), or 1 small onion, chopped
  • 1⁄8 cup all-purpose (plain) flour
  • 1⁄4 teaspoon salt
  • 1⁄4 teaspoon ground black pepper
  • 1⁄4 teaspoon seasoned salt
  • 1 bay leaf
  • 1 cup beef broth
  • 1 clove garlic, minced
  • 1⁄2 teaspoon paprika
  • 1⁄2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce

Directions

  1. Prep the meat
  2. Place raw meat in slow cooker.
  3. In a small bowl, mix together the flour, salt, pepper, and seasoned salt.
  4. Pour the mixture over the meat, and stir to coat meat with flour mixture. I use my hands to coat the meat with the flour mixture.
  5. Prep the vegetables
  6. Chop and dice the vegetables per the ingredients.
  7. Put all of the vegetables in a large bowl, and mix them together.
  8. Add bay leaf to vegetable mixture.
  9. Prep the broth
  10. In a small bowl, mix the beef broth, Worcestershire sauce, paprika, and minced garlic together.
  11. Combine all the ingredients in the slow cooker
  12. First I add the broth mixture to slow cooker
  13. Next I slowly add vegetables to slow cooker, and mix with the meat and broth
  14. Once everything has been added to the slow cooker, I give everything another stir to mix together.
  15. Start cooking
  16. Cover the stew.
  17. Cook on Low setting for 10 to 12 hours, or on High setting for 4 to 6 hours. Most times I cook on high for 5-6 hours.
  18. Enjoy your beef stew!