Irish Lamb Stew With Dumplings
You will not find a comfort food more satisfying than a good old-fashioned Irish lamb stew with dumplings.
This lamb casserole recipe is really easy to make and the taste is absolutely divine.
This slow-cook recipe is not so quick to make but it is certainly well worth the wait.
The meat will fall off the bone and the sauce becomes naturally thicker and is delicious when mopped up with the dumplings.
Cooking the lamb on the bone definitely improves the taste of this meal.
This lamb stew and dumplings combination is a real success and I will be making this more often.
A traditional Irish stew has always used lamb or mutton, contrary to popular belief that an Irish stew is made with beef and Guinness.
How one cuts the vegetables is really up to you, but I do find that slicing them makes for a pleasing finish that is easy to eat, and helps with the dumplings…..more on this later.
Celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with a traditional Irish Stew
St. Patrick’s Day is a cultural and religious holiday that is celebrated annually on March 17th. It is named after Saint Patrick, the patron saint of Ireland, who is credited with bringing Christianity to Ireland in the 5th century.
The holiday is celebrated by people of Irish descent all over the world. It is particularly popular in Ireland and the United States. It is a day of feasting, drinking, and celebrating Irish culture and heritage.
We celebrate every year on the Wild Atlantic Way in County Clare on the West coast of Ireland.
This recipe is great to make up front, as you can just heat it up when you are ready to eat. Meaning you can enjoy the celebrations and not be stuck in the kitchen all day!
How do you make Dumplings?
Normally suet (cow fat) is used to make Irish dumplings. However, I did not have any handy and have used butter instead in this recipe, which I must say has given a surprisingly successful result!
These herb dumplings without suet were really delicious and so simple to make. It always still astounds me what a variety of different foods you can make with butter and flour!
How long does it take for dumplings to cook in a stew?
I find that the trick to getting good dumplings is to let them cook in the steam of the stew rather than in the stew itself.
Therefore I try to give the stew some body, with the slicing of the vegetables and layering, so you can balance the dumplings on top.
It took these dumplings 30 minutes to cook in the oven inside the Dutch oven. You can of course always use a casserole dish instead, but make sure you have a good tight lid and no escaping steam so that the dumplings absorb the taste of the stew!
I suppose I could also have considered using some Guinness to make a Guinness lamb stew. I am sure that would be wonderful, but really it would change this meal.
This recipe is uncluttered and uncomplicated as it is, and certainly, for the taste it does not need anything else. You may wish to add a handful of pearl barley which helps to thicken up the soup. I love it, but my wife does not, so I left it out of this recipe.
I hope you enjoy this lamb stew and dumplings recipe as much as we did.
If you do make this recipe, please let me know how you get on in the comments section below!
How to make lamb stew with dumplings
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Irish Lamb Stew with Dumplings
This Irish lamb stew and dumplings recipe is very simple to make and absolutely delicious. The herby dumplings are perfect for mopping up the tasty stew sauce.
Ingredients
- 600g lean lamb chops, on the bone
- 1 onion, sliced
- 200g carrots, peeled and sliced
- 350g potatoes, peeled and sliced
- Olive oil (to fry)
- 3 Sprigs of fresh thyme, chopped
- 1500ml lamb stock
- 2 tbsp flour
- Salt and Ground Black Pepper
For the dumplings:
- 1 cup flour
- 1/3 cup butter
- ¼ cup cold water
- 2 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 180C.
- Slice up the carrots, onion and potatoes. Trim the fat off the meat and discard the fat. Season the flour with salt and pepper on a plate and cover both sides of the lamb pieces with the flour.
- Using a casserole (Dutch oven), heat the oil and sear both sides of the lamb until nicely browned. Then remove the lamb back to the plate with flour and turn off the heat.
- Put a layer of potatoes, carrot and onion on the bottom of the casserole and cover with the lamb pieces and any remaining flour. Then cover with another layer of potatoes and carrots.
- Carefully add the hot stock to the pan and add the chopped thyme. Season to taste.
- Bring to the boil and then, with the lid on, put in the oven for 1,5 hours.
- Then prepare the dumplings by rubbing the butter into the flour and parsley until you have a sort of crumble mixture.
- Just before the 1,5 hours is up, add the cold water to the crumble mix to make a dough, from which you can form about 4 good sized round dumplings.
- Then remove the pan from the oven and carefully place the dumplings on top of the stew, so that the steam will cook them. Then return the lid and place the casserole back in the oven.
- Cook for another 30 minutes, during which time the dumplings should rise, and the stew should be cooked.
Notes
This will give you 3-4 good portions.
Serve up in a bowl with some tasty buttered Irish wheaten bread if you can get it.
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Nutrition Information:
Yield: 8 Serving Size: 1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 969Total Fat: 63gSaturated Fat: 29gTrans Fat: 1gUnsaturated Fat: 30gCholesterol: 264mgSodium: 385mgCarbohydrates: 27gFiber: 2gSugar: 2gProtein: 70g
This nutrition information was automatically calculated by Nutritionix, but may not be 100% accurate.