Lean beef pieces are used in this hearty, flavorful Vegetable Beef Soup, which is cooked slowly until it is absolutely tender. This nutritious soup is filled with chunks of vegetables and potatoes and makes a cozy dinner on a chilly day.
What goes in Vegetable Beef Soup
Here’s what you need.
- Anything affordable, cut into bite-sized pieces, and stewed with beef (keep in mind that we’re making a soup here, not a stew)
- Red wine, stout, or guinness all work well in this situation. Red wine gives the soup a traditional beef stew flavor, while Guinness or stout will give it a richer, deeper flavor similar to Irish Guinness Stew. Because I always have some on hand and prefer not to use just a portion of a can of beer that I wouldn’t choose to drink, I use wine the most frequently.
How to make Beef Soup
The most important step in this process is to aggressively brown the beef. The brown bits at the bottom of the pot that dissolve into the broth give the beef and the broth a ton of flavor.
Although it’s not required, I like to finish by adding the mushrooms after they’ve been sautéed in butter. There is no contest between mushrooms that have been browned in butter and those that have simply simmered in broth (but really, it is optional).
Fall-apart slow cooked beef!
You will receive the fall-apart beef that I promised you. And the recipe video below will demonstrate how tender the beef is using the most absurd of tools—chopsticks!
I know, I know, it’s soooo Asian.
I mean, how else can I pry a piece of beef apart with one hand? But at that precise moment while I was filming, it was the first idea that came to me as the simplest way to show it on camera.
What Beef Soup goes with
This soup contains a ton of vegetables, and you could add even more. Green beans would be ideal, but on the day I shot this, they were outrageously overpriced, and I just couldn’t do it.
As a result, it is the perfect meal in a bowl and requires nothing else. However, I’m fairly certain that nobody would decline a side of quick cheesy garlic bread or one of these soup dunkers:
Also, this soup just gets better with time and freezes 100% perfectly So make a double batch! ~ Nagi x.
Watch how to make it
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Vegetable Beef Soup (Fall apart beef!)
- ▢ 1.5 tbsp olive oil , separated
- ▢ 500g/1 lb stewing beef , cut into 1. 75cm / 2/3″ cubes (Note 1).
- ▢ 1/2 tsp salt and pepper
- ▢ 1 onion , chopped
- ▢ 3 garlic , minced (1 tbsp)
- ▢ 2 celery , cut into 0. 8 cm / 1/3″ slices.
- ▢ 3 carrots , cut into 0. 5 cm / 1/5″ thick slices (halve larger ones).
- ▢ 4 tbsp flour
- ▢ 2 1/2 cups (625ml) beef broth/stock , low sodium
- 1 1/2 cups (375 ml) dry red wine, Stout, Guinness, or beer (Note 2).
- ▢ 1.5 cups (375ml) water
- ▢ 2 tbsp tomato paste
- ▢ 2 bay leaves
- ▢ 1 tsp thyme dried
- ▢ 1 cup frozen peas
- ▢ 2 potatoes (any), cut into 1.5cm / 2/3″ cubes
- ▢ 1 tbsp (15g) butter or oil
- ▢ 200g/ 6oz small mushrooms , quartered or halved
- In a large, heavy-based pot over high heat, warm 1 tablespoon of oil until it is extremely hot.
- Apply paper towels to dry the beef, then season with salt and pepper.
- aggressively brown beef in two or three batches, adding additional oil as necessary. Remove browned beef into a bowl.
- If pot looks dry, add a touch more oil.
- Add garlic and onion, cook for 2 minutes.
- Cook for 2 minutes, or until onion is translucent, after adding the carrot and celery.
- Add the flour, then slowly pour the beef broth while stirring constantly.
- Stir well after adding the beer, water, tomato paste, bay leaves, and thyme. Then add the beef back in.
- Cover, adjust heat to medium low so its bubbling gently. Simmer for 1 hour 15 minutes, or until the beef is fairly tender.
- Potatoes and peas should be added. Simmer without a lid for an additional 20 minutes. Add cooked mushrooms in the last 5 minutes.
- When the potatoes are done and the beef is extremely tender, the soup is ready (watch video).
- (I like a lot of pepper in this!) Adjust the salt and pepper to your liking.
- Ladle into bowls. Sprinkle with parsley and serve with crusty bread if desired. A quick and simple Irish soda bread recipe is also available.
- Melt butter in a large skillet over medium high heat. Add mushrooms and cook for 5 minutes until browned. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
- Red wine – any dry, full bodied red wine. Cab Sauv and Merlots are ideal.
- Dark beers, such as Guinness Beer and Stout, are indicated as such on the cans. You should find these at most liquor stores. Use some, sip some, or pour the entire can in and simmer with the lid off for longer!
- Add 400g/14 oz of crushed tomato and 2 teaspoons of Worcestershire sauce to the non-alcoholic sub. This will add alternative flavour to compensate.
Originally published May 2019. Updated for housekeeping matters March 2020, no change to recipe.
More chunky, hearty soups
This is what a doggy smile looks like.
(And if we had Life of Dozer, we’d be grinning too!!!)
Melt-in-your-mouth Beef and Vegetable Soup
FAQ
How do you fix watery vegetable soup?
Several tablespoons of flour or cornstarch should be added to the bowl; whisk until well combined. Then, simmer the soup while adding the mixture back to the pot. Pro tip: Don’t dump in the entire mixture at once. You may thicken your soup too much.
How do you thicken vegetable soup?
6 Ways to Thicken Soups or StewsPuree the vegetables. The simplest method for thickening soup is to puree the vegetables. Mash beans, lentils, rice, or bread. Add some dairy. Add an egg. Whisk in a bit of flour or starch. Blend in some silken tofu.
How do you thicken soup after it is made?
Thicken with a Starch Cornstarch. Cornstarch is a great way to thicken soup without flour. Simply combine a tablespoon of starch with warmed milk or water to avoid clumping. This mixture is known as a “slurry. ”.
How do you make soup thicker without flour or cornstarch?
A handful of uncooked rice. That’s all folks, just a handful of white rice. Any kind will do: jasmine, basmati, short grain, long grain. When rice is added to a brothy (or watery, even) soup and simmered for 20 to 30 minutes, the starch in the rice releases, thickening the liquid that the rice is cooking in.