The stew beef conundrum.

chunky chili...

mmmmmm.

great idea!

Personally, I adore homemade meat pies Yummy!

Tenderize and marinate it and make kebabs or slice it thin and have a stir fry.

Slow cook it and shred it for tacos.

Beef rendang. Vegetable-beef soup. Put it in a slow cooker with some bbq sauce, shred it and make Pulled Beef Sammies.

if you slow cook them you can make tips and gravy over rice.

but I like chili better...

galosh

jerk beef strips

make tons a jerky

bourgionogne (lotsa red wine for flavor--a chianti is great)

beef chunks in a xhili sauce (with onions) all over Raza

Yes what I was going to suggest. I usually make chili with stew beef - much better than ground beef.

I've used this recipe

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/emeril-lagasse/emerils-beef-stew-recipe/index.html

I would braise the pieces, dredged with salt/pepper flour in a little oil until brown, then take them out, put in one chopped onion and slowly sweat that into something soft.
Add some beef broth and some water and stew the beef either on the stove or in the oven until it's just about done. (an hour and an half or so with either method)
Meanwhile, chop up some mushrooms sauté them in some butter, take them out and pour in some red wine (1/3 cup--- maybe a half) reduce it down by half, add an equal amount of beef broth. You're going to end up with a 1/2 cup of liquid.

Put the mushrooms back in, take the stewed beef and onions and mix them into the reduction, add whatever on the stewing liquid you think you need and ----- a dollop of sour cream.
Pour over hot egg noodles for a really nice Stroganoff.... yum.
~~
Take two
~~ Stew the beef as above BUT take about half of drippings from the browning step to make a nice gravy with some shallots, a little butter and white wine, some thyme and tarragon. Pour over the stewed beef. If you don't tell anyone they will think they are having Chateaubriand! Make some potatoes and carrots to go with that.
~~
Take three
Stew the beef. Freeze it in half pound servings. Freeze the beef broth too. (In freezer bags, I love them) You can always throw the meat into a medley of slow sautéed chopped carrots, celery, onions for actual stew

or add tomato paste and tomatoes for pasta sauce (add in some anise and they will think there is sausage in there somewhere.)

OR go Greek with eggplant, mushrooms, olives and peppers..

Joe (the beef goes on, yeah, the beef goes on...)Nation

stoganoff, skewered with veggies on the grill (marinate first), stir fry, beef pies

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/grillades-and-grits-recipe/index.html

I love Grillades and Grits - of course the grits are optional. But holy cow - so good.

I also make some substitutions on Paula's choice of fats to use. I don't use bacon grease. It still tastes amazing to me.

Paula Deen - what the heck you trying to kill us.

I agree with JoeNation, and past that recommend looking up braising recipes in general.

Kabobs.

http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1926,151160-239200,00.html

Yep - that is exactly what I am trying to do.

I think most folks know not to eat most of her recipes for every meal...but this one is really not so bad...like I said - rethink the fats - they can be reduced and substituted. But it is a very nice change from regular stew.

bacon grease is a gift from heaven.

(unless you're jewish)

Of course it is...and I certainly don't mind using it sometimes. Especially in my corn bread.

But - there's always a way to substitute if you don't like it. Or if you'd rather not use it for health reasons.

You guys (and gals) rock. Thank-you verra much.
I had no idea stew beef was so versatile. I thought it might be too tough for some of the above ideas.
I think I'll try braising it tomorrow. It's thawing as we speak. I like the kabobs too, but it's I'm out of propane at the moment. Yet another thing to add to the list.
Chili eh! never thought of that...
Meat pies yummmmm, I'll bet I could do a variation of Shepard's pie too.
Excellent this gives me some food for thought, pardon the pun. lol

the key is in cooking the toughness out of it...

good luck.

Hungarian Goulash

1 kg beef for stews, cubed
3-4 big onions, finely chopped
4-5 tbsp olive oil
3-4 tbsp best quality Hungarian sweet paprika
salt, pepper

Heat oil in a saucepan. Add the finely chopped onions and cook until translucent. Now comes an important secret step: remove the saucepan from the heat and now add the paprika – this is very important as if you would do this step still on the heat, the paprika could burn from the sudden heat and get bitter. Put it back, add beef cubes and stir so that the spicy onion mix covers the meat evenly. Cover with about 100-150ml water so that the liquid doesn’t completely cover the meat. Simmer covered on very low heat for about 1,5 to 2 hours. After 1 hour, check, add a litle more water if necessary, so the stew doesn’t burn. Depending on the thickness of the sauce, cook for 10-15 minutes uncovered so that all the liquid reduces and all what you get is a spicy, thick sauce which covers the meat. It tastes even better reheated. Serve with noodles, potatoes or dumplings.

Good tip CJ!!

Joe(gonna try that tomorrow)NATION

Wow, that sounds good. Plus easy.

I have to laugh, I usually like CJane's recipes. And when we met a couple of years ago and went to lunch, we ordered the same thing, except that our wines were different, though both white if I remember. Good woman.