Beef & Root Vegetable Stew

As the cold weather - well, maybe slightly cool, anyway - starts hitting, we do even more campfire cooking than normal!

On our fall camping trip last year, we found ourselves making every manner of delicious stew and soup we could find ingredients for while on the road. I’ve already posted the recipes for my Campfire Chili and Hearty Campfire Beef Stew, so I guess it’s time to post my Beef and Root Vegetable Stew recipe.

This delicious campfire stew was loosely inspired by my original campfire stew recipe. It’s a simple meal to cook over an open fire - whether a fire pit or a charcoal grill.

Like that original beef stew, this root vegetable stew is a hearty stew that slow cooks over a few hours ... but reheats well to make an easy meal for the next long day you may face!

It’s also just a really good stew.

While my original camp stew had a few base root veggies in it, this one really has root vegetables taking centre stage.

At the time I designed the recipe, I was really in the mood for beets - just a random craving out of nowhere - but also kind of wanted a big bowl of stew.

We were staying at Fairbank Provincial Park at the time, and the weather had kind of taken a turn - blustery, rainy... Par for the course, that time of year.

Still... I wanted comfort food! Something warm, hearty, and maybe even pretty.

So, I used up a bunch of different colours of root veggies we had on hand. I was worried that the deep red beets would stain everything else and make for a weird pink mess.

Instead I ended up with a richly coloured, super earthy, rich and satisfying stew.

SO good - let me show you how to make it!

Ingredients

This Beef Stew with Root Vegetables recipe uses really basic ingredients, that you should be able to find at pretty much any local grocery store, throughout the year.

That makes it a good one for our camping trips - sometimes, we are WAY out in the middle of nowhere, with the grocery stores being smaller than we could even have imagined!

Also, root vegetables store really well for a long time, so you can buy everything you need before even leaving for your trip.

I like to looks at this recipe as a framework. If I can’t find one of the root vegetables, I’ll swap in more of one of the others.

Anyway, a few ingredient notes for you:

Beef

You’re cooking low and slow, so the cheaper cuts with a lot of connective tissue work well in this stew.

I usually get a beef chuck roast for making stew, but “Stewing beef” or bottom round are also good options.

Beef Broth

I usually just pick up packs of whatever beef broth I can find, with a preference to the lower sodium versions. Reduced sodium broth gives you more flexibility to season it to your personal taste.

That said, feel free to use a homemade beef stock if you prefer. While I’ve made homemade chicken stock on camping trips a bunch of times, I haven’t bothered to do the same with beef bones, yet.

Vegetables

I use a fairly basic mix of root in this recipe - Beets, Carrot, and Rutabaga - as well as some mushrooms, celery, yellow onions, and garlic

If you can’t get one of these, feel free to substitute more of one of the other ones, or a similar veggie.

Turnips, rutabaga, carrots, celery root, and parsnips are all relatively interchangeable.

I’m not sure what I would sub for mushrooms or celery (aside from maybe having to use white / button mushrooms instead of crimini), but luckily those are usually the most easy to find in ANY grocery store.

Oil

You’ll be heating your cast iron dutch oven over a hot fire to sear the beef in the first step, so you’ll want an oil that has a high smoke point.

I usually use Avocado oil for this - NOT olive oil - but vegetable oil would also work.

Thickener

There are a few different ways you can thicken your stew, based on your dietary needs.

Corn starch is the easiest to come by, and arrowroot starch is a good alternative if you’re on a paleo or AIP diet.

If you want to keep it a bit lower carb, use Xanthan Gum instead - you’ll need less of it, see the recipe cards for the amounts.

Note: If you like a really thick stew, you can increase your thickener by up to 50% - just do it up front. Adding any of these to a pot of boiling stew without mixing in the herbs is going to produce clumps.

Everything Else

Rounding out this recipe, you will need:

Bay Leaves
Dried Parsley
Dried Rosemary>
Dried Thyme
Salt & Ground Black Pepper

The only real note I have here is that if you’d prefer to use fresh herbs for any of these, use 3x the amount called for in the recipe.

How to Make Beef & Root Vegetable Stew

The full recipe is in the printable recipe card at the bottom of this post, here is the visual walk through:

Trim roast of excess fat, cut into 1" large pieces. Allow to come up to room temperature.

Pat beef cubes dry with a paper towel, season with a little bit of salt and pepper.

Measure about 1 tablespoon of the oil into a large, heavy pot or Dutch oven. Heat over a high fire.

Add the beef to the heated pan. Sear, stirring occasionally, until browned all over.

Once browned, add a splash of the beef broth to the pan, scraping and stirring the beef drippings - this is called deglazing.

Once the beef is all scraped off the bottom of the pan and incorporated, add remaining beef broth and the bay leaves.

Bring to a boil, then reduce fire to maintain a low simmer. Simmer over a low heat fire for 1 ½ hours, or until meat is very tender.

Once beef is tender, add all of the vegetables to the pot, stir to combine.

Bring it to a boil again, then turn heat back down to low and simmer for another 40 minutes or so - until the vegetables are tender.

In a small bowl, combine the starch, dried parsley, dried thyme, and dried rosemary. Be sure to stir well - you want the starch (or xanthan gum) well distributed over the other ingredients, to prevent clumping.

Add herb mixture to the pot, stir well to combine. Allow stew to simmer for a few minutes to thicken.

Taste, season with salt and pepper to taste.

Remove bay leaves, and serve hot.

Leftover Beef & Root Vegetable Stew

After cooling to room temperature, leftover stew can be transferred to an airtight container or freezer bag.

It will keep for 3 days in the fridge, or several months in the freezer.

More One-Pot Camping Recipes

Looking for more easy - but satisfying! - one pot meals to cook over your campfire? Here are some of my favourites!

Bacon Cheeseburger Soup
Cajun Chicken Sloppy Joes
Campfire Chicken Curry
Campfire Chili
Dutch Oven Jambalaya
Egg Roll in a Bowl
Hearty Campfire Beef Stew
Sloppy Giuseppes
Traditional Sloppy Joes

... But wait, there's more! See our main Camping Recipes page for ALL of our camping recipes - snacks, desserts, mixes to make ahead of time, and more!