Beef Stew Casserole

This is our easy beef stew casserole with egg noodles. It’s comfort food at it’s finest!! Packed with tender stew meat, carrots, celery and potatoes, your kids are going to want seconds of this for dinner.

If you’re a busy mom like me you love a good casserole recipe! My favorite is this easy beef stew casserole recipe we make regularly! It’s on the top of our list of quick and easy casseroles!  Adjust as you wish according to the vegetables you love but potatoes, celery, onions, and carrots are a must in our beef stew.

A close second is this Swedish meatball casserole made earlier this year. They both have the same idea where you saute the meat until no longer pink, make the sauce and add noodles. I like adding diced vegetables, usually frozen, but that is up to you and of course optional. And you can go from there….

After the meatballs, I made this one after thinking about our other favorite meals. Top of the list, it had to be our beef stew. It only makes it better adding noodles and fried onions though! That is right, French’s fried aren’t just for on top of green beans at Thanksgiving y’all. They add a ton of flavor to any meal and a texture on top when you have an overall soft dish overall.

Casserole with Stew Meat

Ok so we make a lot of stew meat recipes around here. If you grew up in the 80s I bet your mom did quite a few too. Why?? Um because that cut is kinda’ the leftovers so it is sold super cheap. We buy half a cow each year so we get quite a few packages of it that needs to be used up. I hate wasting food so that isn’t an option.

Here are the instructions as well as a video below showing you how to make beef stew casserole at home. You want to dice your vegetables up like you see here, the thicker the carrots the more turgid they’ll be.

Next I cut the beef stew meat into very small bite size pieces (the smaller the more tender they will get, you can substitute with ground beef too if you prefer). I like lean meat, or trim fat off while I’m dicing the meat.

Now on to the detailed directions below so you can make this easy beef stew casserole yourself!

Ingredient Notes

You are going to want to start out with a package of Stew meat, or dice up any type of beef or steak. Since you are precooking the meat tossed in a bit of flour (at least browning it to begin with) you could even use ground beef if you’d rather.

As far as transforming this old fashioned (normally in a thick sauce) into a casserole we do this with boiled to al dente Egg noodles. You could use any medium sized pasta really but I think the texture of these wide versions work the best.

I like to add vegetables to any meal and in this case I go with the classics of what I would typically add to this dish such as; Celery, Carrots, Potatoes and sometimes some sliced or diced Onions.

I use some Beef broth to create more of a sauce which offers a lot more flavor than if you were to just use water. And to make it over the top delicious I sprinkle with crunchy fried onions on the top!!

I use a 9×13 glass pan for this one. You could use a bit larger or a casserole dish around that size too if that is what you have. If I do have time I will make our own crispy fried onions. That isn’t always the case so I always have a container or two of the other handy.

Tips

If you love carrots but not fond of celery, then just add more of those. If you like them really soft then make sure to slice your carrots thinner, or thicker. The larger the vegetables are the firmer they will be once this is done. The ones you see here turned out soft but not mushy which is how I prefer them.

Same goes with your potatoes. I dice those pieces so they are nice and soft when this beef stew casserole is one, and topped with some green onions or chives it’s just an amazing comfort food I am sure your whole family will love.

With this or our Beef stroganoff casserole can be made with similar choices. A creamier version with sour cream and all the classic flavors you love in one dish.

We love this Instant Pot hamburger casserole. It’s warm and creamy using cream of chicken or mushroom soup and lots of cheese and rice. You can make a similar version of this following our Instant Pot beef stew casserole instructions. Slow cooker stew is another method of cooking.

What is the difference between a casserole and a stew?

I feel like you can call anything whatever you want really but the distinction between the two is the cooking process. A stew or Instant Pot chicken stew is where heat is applied to the bottom of the pot, over a fire or on a stove, versus a casserole that is generally baked in the oven.

They are both one pot meals where you can throw in ingredients you have on hand and love it. Keep in mind that the smaller the pieces of meat and veggies are the more tender they will become. Thus I make beef pieces small, and vegetables larger so they don’t fall apart.