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Low Carb Instant Pot Beef Stew.
Who doesn’t love a savory, home-cooked meal at the end of the day? Our easy instant pot beef stew is a recipe that is sure to remind you of home. With notes of red wine, garlic, and Italian herbs, this easy beef stew recipe will have you drooling over your plate!
And we’re super excited to announce that Instant Pot gave us a 6 Quart Instant Pot and we are going to host a giveaway for all of our readers! If you’re just here for the giveaway just scroll all the way to the bottom 🙂
So the problem with traditional beef stews or slow cooker beef stews is they take forever to make. Forget about waiting 2–8 hours for your beef stew! This pressure cooker beef stew recipe only takes a fraction of your day to prepare.
We’re talking just 25 minutes of prep time and 45 minutes of cook time and you’ll have a delicious home cooked low carb dinner.
How to make beef stew
Beef stew is just one of those things that can be made a hundred different ways. You can make it in a skillet or crock pot, but our favorite way to make the best beef stew recipe is in your Instant Pot!
For our easy beef stew recipe,
- Turn pressure cooker on, press “Sauté”, and wait 2 minutes for the pot to heat up. Add ghee and beef and cook until seared, flipping once halfway through. Then transfer the beef to a bowl.
- Next, add ghee, onion, carrot, parsnip, and mushrooms. Cook about 2 minutes, stirring frequently. Then, add garlic and cook 30 seconds more, stirring constantly. Stir in red wine and cook 1 minute. Press “Cancel” to stop sautéing.
- Next, add the beef back to the pot along with water, tomato paste, beef gelatin, Italian herb seasoning, salt, and black pepper. Turn the pot on Manual, High Pressure for 35 minutes and then let the pressure naturally release for 10 minutes before doing a quick release.
- Serve garnished with fresh thyme on top of cauliflower mash.
What kind of beef is used for beef stew?
Stewing is a moist-heat method, so it is bed to use tough cuts of meat when making beef stew. The most common beef stew meat is chuck or round cuts. These become more tender and flavorful when they are cooked in the Instant Pot or pressure cooker.
Instant Pot beef stew ingredients
Our easy instant pot beef stew recipe is filled with a whole lot of yummy ingredients including:
- clarified butter (ghee)
- grass-fed beef chuck steak
- onion
- carrot
- parsnip
- mushrooms
- garlic
- dry red wine
- water or low-sodium beef stock
- tomato paste
- grass-fed beef gelatin
- dried Italian herb mix
- salt
- black pepper
- Fresh thyme, for garnish (optional)
- Cauliflower mash, for serving (optional)
If you wanna make this a paleo beef stew, simply omit the wine and gelatin if you are super strict.
Pressure cooker beef stew calories
In our instant pot beef stew recipe, there are about 380 calories per serving.
How to thicken beef stew (and keep it low carb!)
To thicken a traditional beef stew, you might add flour or cornstarch to the recipe. Since we want this to be a low carb beef stew, we will not be adding either of those ingredients.
For our instant pot beef stew, we kept a nice thick consistency by adding grass-fed beef gelatin. If you it’s an even thicker beef stew you desire, you can add xanthan gum or a bit of tapioca starch!
Low carb Instant Pot beef stew spices
We kept it pretty simple! The spices that we used in our simple beef stew recipe are:
- Dried Italian herb mix
- salt
- pepper
- and a little thyme as a garnish!
Some other common herbs and spices used in beef stew include parsley, basil, oregano, rosemary, and paprika. Most of these are already combined in the Italian herb mix that we used.
Do you put tomatoes in beef stew?
It really depends on what you like. We incorporated tomato paste into our beef stew recipe, but some may add tomato chunks as well. It’s up to you to decide what kind of textures and flavors you prefer for your beef stew. Also depends on how many carbs you want your beef stew to contain.
Can you overcook beef stew?
Yes, you can overcook beef stew. We know you want to put it in the crock pot and leave it all day long, but be careful! If you cook your stew too long, your dinner may be dried beef and soggy vegetables.
Making beef stew in the instant pot is a great way to avoid overcooking. If you follow our recipe directions, you’re sure to have flavorful, moist cuts of beef in your beef stew.
Try these other low carb recipes for soups and stews!
- Keto Weeknight Creamy Sausage and Spinach Soup : The Keto Queens
- Ground Beef Stroganoff : Jennifer Banz
- Instant Pot Low Carb Cauliflower Soup : Lara Clevenger
- An Ethiopian Feast: Ground Beef Stew, Collard Greens, and Teff Flatbread : An Edible Mosaic
Other Keto Instant Pot Recipes You Need to try!
- Keto Crack Chicken
- Mississippi Pot Roast
- Low Carb Chili
- Buffalo Chicken Dip
- Instant Pot Keto Cinnamon Rolls
- Low Carb Instant Pot Green Bean Casserole Recipe
- Instant Pot Keto English Muffin Low Carb Bread Recipe
- Instant Pot Keto Creamy Garlic Broccoli Mash
- Corned Beef and Cabbage
If you loved this post or any of our recipes, please leave a comment below. We love hearing from you! You can also tag #theketoqueens on social media. To stay up-to-date, FOLLOW US on Instagram @theketoqueens, Twitter, and Facebook.
Low Carb Instant Pot Beef Stew
Ingredients
- 4 tablespoons ghee divided
- 2 lbs grass-fed beef chuck steak cut into 2-inch cubes
- 1 medium onion chopped
- 1 medium carrot cut into 2-inch pieces
- 1 medium parsnip cut into 2-inch pieces
- 8 oz button mushrooms quartered
- 6 cloves garlic minced
- 1/2 cup dry red wine
- 2 cups water or low-sodium beef stock
- 2 tablespoons tomato paste
- 1 tablespoon grass-fed beef gelatin
- 1/2 tablespoon dried Italian herb mix
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- Fresh thyme for garnish (optional)
- Cauliflower mash for serving (optional)
Instructions
- Turn pressure cooker on, press “Sauté”, and wait 2 minutes for the pot to heat up. Add the ghee and once melted, add the beef and cook until seared, about 3 to 5 minutes, flipping once halfway through. Transfer the beef to a bowl. (You may need to sear the beef in 2 batches so you don’t crowd the pot.)
- Add the remaining 2 tablespoons ghee, onion, carrot, parsnip, and mushrooms. Cook briefly until the vegetables take on a little color, about 2 minutes, stirring frequently. Add the garlic and cook 30 seconds more, stirring constantly. Stir in the red wine and cook 1 minute, scraping up any brown bits from the bottom of the pot. Press “Cancel” to stop sautéing.
- Add the beef back to the pot along with the water, tomato paste, beef gelatin, Italian herb seasoning, salt, and black pepper. Turn the pot on Manual, High Pressure for 35 minutes and then let the pressure naturally release for 10 minutes before doing a quick release.
- Serve garnished with fresh thyme on top of cauliflower mash.
Nutrition
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While mine came out as beef soup (all I could find was Knox gelatin, which seemed to do nothing), the flavor is madhouse yum! I used Kettle & Fire beef broth and added radishes – I’d never cooked with radishes, and I’d never know they were radishes now. Very tasty – thanks for the recipe!
This recipe came out so rich and flavorful!! I’ve skipped the gelatin (didn’t have at home) but the stew was still consistent.
For the herbs, I’ve used sage (predominant flavor), thyme, terragon and bay leaves.
Will for sure repeat it (eventually add bacon).
Does this recipe freeze well if I make ahead?
Allison, Yes, this recipe freezes very well!
Made this last night and loved it. But I was wondering about the parsnips – they are fairly high in carbs. I know the “net carbs” may be much lower but still. I may want to substitute something else for them.
Tutuncommon, We’re so happy you enjoyed this recipe! Yes, you can still make this stew without the parsnips if the net carbs of the overall dish are too high to fit into your macros, or if you just want to lower the net carbs a bit. You could either omit them, or use a lower carb vegetable instead. Please let us know how it goes if you use something other than parsnips – we love to hear about how readers put their own spin on our recipes!
This was sooooo good! Even my husband, who was wary of the wine and parsnips, loved it!!
Thanks for sharing 🙂
Hi Amber,
We’re so glad you and your husband loved it!
Is there a way to make it with frozen stew meat instead?
Hi Katie,
We haven’t tried it with frozen meat before.
Made this tonight. It was SO good!
Thank you Faith, I appreciate this yummy recipe, we have just started the keto lifestyle.
Hi Hope,
We’re glad you loved the recipe!
I would make chicken and dumplings.
I would make my world famous beef stew.
Pulled pork sandwiches.
I would love to make beef stew!
I would love to make a beef stew.