Basic Beef Stew with Carrots and Mushrooms

This is the first time I have ever made beef stew believe it or not. The weather here in Missouri is still pretty warm, but today we seem to have a cool front passing through. I had to take a class today, so I adapted this recipe for the crock pot.

Basic Beef Stew with Carrots and Mushrooms

Source: Adapted from Cooking Light

1 tablespoon olive oil, divided (I omitted)

1 pound small cremini mushrooms (I used sliced button mushrooms)

2 cups chopped onion

3 garlic cloves, minced

1/3 cup all purpose flour

2 pounds of beef stew meat, cut into bite sized pieces (I used 1.4 pounds)

3/4 teaspoon salt, divided

1 cup dry red wine

1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme (I used dried thyme)

2 (14 oz) cans less sodium beef broth

1 bay leaf (I omitted)

2 cups cubed peeled white potatoes

1 1/2 cups sliced carrots

1/2 teaspoon ground pepper

Heat 1 teaspoon olive oil in a large dutch oven over medium high heat (I used cooking spray instead of olive oil).

Add mushrooms, and saute for 5 minutes or until mushrooms begin to brown. Spoon mushrooms into a large bowl. Lightly coat pan with cooking spray. Add onion; saute 10 minutes or until tender and golden brown. Add garlic; saute 1 minute. Add onions to mushrooms.

Place flour in a shallow bowl or pie plate. Dredge beef in flour, shaking off excess. Heat remaining 2 teaspoons of oil in pan over medium high heat. Add half of beef mixture, sprinkle with 1/8 teaspoon of salt. Cook 6 minutes, browning on all sides. Add beef to mushroom mixture. Repeat procedure with remaining beef.

 Add 1 cup of red wine to pan, scraping pan to loosen bits. Add thyme, broth, and bay leaf, bring to a boil. At this point I added the beef, mushrooms and onion mixture, and wine/broth to my crock pot. I cooked it on low all day.

 Before dinner I sampled the stew and found it to be a bit bland. I added salt to taste. I also had 1 1/2 cups of green beans leftover from dinner the night before that I added  to the stew. I thought these additions pepped it up a bit.

*For those of you following Weight Watchers I ran this recipe with my modifications through the recipe builder. With my modifications, the recipe is 4 points with 8 servings.