Slow Cooker Beef Curry

This creamy beef curry dish is a perfect meal for the winter season. The recipe is simple and it’s easy to make. Buy the beef stew chunks with the most visible marble in the store for your beef curry stew, this kind of cut yields the most tender, flavorful and juicy beef stew. You can choose to cook the beef curry in a slow cooker or in a dutch oven over the stovetop. Here I used my heavy duty Le Creuset over my induction cooktop, it’s just like the slow cooker because the induction cooktop has a very low temperature control. If you choose to use slow cooker, I’d suggest that you go through the seasoning the beef and the quick boil process in the pan first then transfer them to the slow cooker to cook for 3-4 hours. The seasoning process is the first and the most important step for cooking this beef curry. I like to use the Japanese Golden Curry mix (Extra Spicy) for my curry dish because they are really good and handy for cooking. But I have also used my homemade curry mix and they’re great too. Hope you will try to cook this hearty beef curry dish soon.

• 2 lb beef stew cut, I like to rinse the beef quickly in the very hot but not quite boiled water to get rid of the blood first. But you don’t have to do this.
• Homemade curry mix: 3 tablespoon curry powder + 1.5 teaspoon cumin powder + 2 teaspoon cornstarch or store bought curry mix. Mix all the ingredients in a measurement cup with 1/2 cup of water and set it aside. I like to use the extra spicy mix because my family loves everything spicy.
• Pick a starchy vegetable like potato, butternut squash, eggplant or green beans for the beef curry dish to add more creaminess to the curry.

• Prepare the dutch oven (or a large heavy duty sauce pan) over the medium high heat, heat the vegetable oil first and add the sliced onion to saute until it’s brown. Add some crushed garlic, black pepper and 1/2 teaspoon cumin powder to make the seasoning.
• Add the beef and stir them well to season the beef for a couple of minutes (I add more cumin powder to the beef because I favor the cumin flavor with beef so much)
• Add water to merge the beef

• Add the store bought curry mix or your homemade curry mixture to the stew. Mix everything well.
• Bring the stew to a quick boil and lower the heat to medium low. Taste the sauce for the strength of the curry flavor. You can add more curry powder if it’s not strong enough, or add 1 cup of water to reduce the flavor.

• Slow cooker method: Transfer everything to the slow cooker after the quick boil. Set the slow cooker for 3-4 hours or longer until the beef tastes tender and soft just the way you like.

• Dutch oven method: After the quick boil, lower the temp to medium low and continue to cook the stew for 3-4 hours or longer until it the beef is tender and soft.