Cooking Again With Stout, Day 5, Counting Down To St. Paddy’s Day With Lamb Stew

Here’s a more contemporary recipe for Irish Lamb Stew from the Anchorage Daily News with a nice history of the dish plus one more non-beer stew recipe too. Of course, it includes stew in the recipe. I’ve included the recipe below, but the full article can be found here;

Irish stout lamb stew

• ½ cup plus 2 tablespoons flour

• 2 teaspoons salt plus more to taste

• Freshly ground pepper

• 3 pounds cubed lamb shoulder

• 3 tablespoons vegetable oil

• 1 16-ounce can stout or dark beer

• 1 ½ pounds red potatoes, quartered

• 3 parsnips peeled, cut into 1-inch chunks

• 3 carrots peeled, cut into 1-inch chunks

• 2 large yellow onions, coarsely chopped

• 4 ribs celery, cut into 1-inch pieces

• 3 cloves garlic, finely chopped

• 3 14 ½-ounce cans low-sodium beef broth

• 1 cup pearl barley

• 12 sprigs parsley

• 3 sprigs thyme

• 2 sprigs rosemary

» Mix ½ cup of the flour, 1 teaspoon of the salt and pepper to taste in a resealable bag; add lamb. Shake to coat lamb. Heat oil in a Dutch oven over medium-high heat. Sear the lamb in batches, until browned on all sides, about 4 minutes per batch. Remove each batch to a plate.

» Stir remaining 2 tablespoons of the flour into the Dutch oven. Cook, stirring, over medium heat, 1 minute. Stir in the stout, scraping up the browned bits. Add the potatoes, parsnips, carrots, onions, celery and garlic. Cook until the liquid is reduced by half, about 20 minutes.

» Return meat to the Dutch oven. Add the broth and barley. Tie the parsley, thyme and rosemary in a bundle with kitchen string; add to Dutch oven. Cook, stirring occasionally, until lamb is fork-tender, about 2 ½ hours. Skim off any fat. Season with remaining teaspoon of the salt and pepper to taste.

» Makes 10 servings.

– chef Steve Perlstein of the Irish American Heritage Center (Perlstein? Must be from the County Cork).