No Peek Stew
Submitted by lindam
No-peek stew simmers beef, onion soup mix, cream of mushroom soup, ginger ale, carrots, and potatoes in a crockpot all day. Set it and walk away, dinner cooks itself.
YIELD
1 batchPREP
15 minCOOK
6 hrsREADY
6 hrsThe six-ingredient crockpot dinner that parents of toddlers and busy households have been leaning on for decades. Dump stewing beef in with a packet of onion soup mix, a can of cream of mushroom soup, some carrots and potatoes, pour ginger ale over the top, and walk away.
The ginger ale is the weird genius move. The sugar helps tenderize the beef while the carbonation carries flavor, and by the end of the long simmer nothing tastes sweet or soda-y, just deep and savory like it cooked with proper stock.
No peek means exactly that. Opening the lid drops the temperature and adds an hour to cooking time, so resist the urge to check. The soup mix and condensed soup form the gravy on their own without any flour or roux work.
The freezer prep trick makes this a true make-ahead meal. Mix the meat with the soups ahead of time, freeze flat in ziplocs, then dump frozen or thawed into the crockpot with the veg on cooking day.
Kitchen Tips
- Don’t lift the lid during cooking. Each peek loses heat and adds roughly 15-20 minutes to the total cook time.
- Cut carrots and potatoes into similar-sized pieces so they finish cooking at the same time.
- Soak cut potatoes overnight in water with a splash of lemon juice to prevent browning without affecting flavor.
- Salt sparingly at the start. Onion soup mix and condensed mushroom soup both carry significant sodium already.
Variations
- Swap ginger ale for Dr Pepper or Coca-Cola for a similar sweet-savory effect with different flavor notes.
- Sub cream of celery or cream of chicken soup for cream of mushroom if you don’t like mushrooms.
- Add a bay leaf and a teaspoon of dried thyme at the start for more herbal depth without any extra work.
Ingredients
Directions
Mix the meat and soups together. At this point I will divide into 4 portions (cooking for 2 adults and 1 toddler) and freeze in ziplock baggies.
The night before cooking day, I’ll pull the baggie out of the freezer and pour into crockpot and cover with ½ can of gingerale (I have done this with the meat mix frozen, but thawed is probably healthier).
Then I’ll add carrots and potatoes and let cook all day on medium heat.
If I know that I’ll be in a major hurry on cooking morning, I’ll cut the potatoes and carrots the night before and have them in the ‘fridge in water with a little lemon juice to prevent the potatoes from browing.
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