Mixin' Mom: Irish Beef Stew with Celtic Trinity Knots

St. Patty's Day is tomorrow! I made a corned beef last week and made a delicious orange-zested Irish Soda Bread yesterday. So, I decided to try a new recipe this year and it was amazing. Irish Beef Stew with simple Celtic Trinity Knot bread sticks. Although, the stew took a good 3 hours to make, our house smelled incredible. The breadsticks were made from Pillsbury Pizza Dough, and didn't take very long to make at all! I do recommend pinching your dough together well once you form your Trinity Knot, so they don't come apart in the oven and look like bow ties! Hope you all have some green beer and Irish Stew to celebrate tomorrow!

Speaking of celebrating, my husband and I worked super hard to get our house ready to be put on the market to sell. We had photographs taken last Wednesday and the listing went live Friday night. We had 7 showings on Saturday and 4 showings on Sunday. TWO offers and a SOLD sign later - we are ready for our journey to Pennsylvania this Summer! What a crazy weekend! I must say I am happy we are done with 'showings' because living in a perfectly staged house with all the kids toys in the garage is not fun. But we kept busy this weekend with an early hike, St. Patty's Day parade, outlet shopping, and a visit to the Children's Museum.

Irish Beef Stew

- 8 cups beef broth
- 1/2 cup barley
- 2 cans of Guinness beer
- 2 lbs. beef cubes for beef stew
- 1/4 cup flour
- 1 tbsp. vegetable oil
- 1 large onion
- 1/3 cup red wine
- 12 carrots, diced
- 12 potatoes, small
- 4 leeks
- 2 potatoes, mashed (did not use)
- 1 tbsp. flour
- 1/2 cup parsley (accidentally forgot!)

1. In a stock pot, bring your beef broth and beer to a simmer. Add your barley.
2. In a large skillet, heat your vegetable oil.
3. In a freezer bag, coat your beef cubes with the 1/4 cup of flour. Brown 1/3 of your beef at a time in the vegetable oil. Place your beef in the beef broth.
4. Add your onion to the beef skillet and cook until transparent. Add to your beef broth.
5. Deglaze your skillet with the wine and scrape everything off the bottom of the pan. Add to the beef broth.
6. Bring to a simmer and cover for 2 hours. Check and stir stew every 20 minutes.
7. Add your carrots, leeks, and potatoes. Allow to simmer for another 40 minutes.
8. Add your tbsp. of flour and mashed potatoes with 1 tbsp. of butter. This will thicken your stew.
9. Stir for another 5-10 minutes.
10. Serve hot with parsley on top to garnish.