Slow Cooker Puerto Rican Beef Stew

Easy Puerto Rican beef stew with potatoes in a thick gravy is killer. Cooked in a dutch oven or in a slow cooker, this stew meat gets fork tender. This is one of my favorite stew meat recipes for sure

Crockpot Puerto Rican beef stew is so good. Just throw it all in your pot before you leave and it will be ready for your family to enjoy for dinner. A protein packed one pot meal with tons of flavor, can be mild or spicy. One of the easy Crockpot recipes we have on our site to share with you. (affiliate links present)

Puerto Rican Stew

This dish is just a feel good comfort food I think we all remember from our childhood. Of course back in the day all the moms would make slow cooker beef stew and that was really the only option as far as a small kitchen appliance went.

Nowadays we have all the things. You can pressure cook the meat to fork tender really fast now if you want to make Instant Pot or Ninja Foodi stew. In fact you could use the timing from that one with the ingredients from this and make it faster that way too. It’s just the sauce and seasonings that differ.

Let’s talk a little bit about slow cooking shall we?? First off I have a few different varieties and I love them all. Each one has an occasion to be used like….

1. This is my favorite 6 quart programmable one with a locking lid so it’s great for bringing to a potluck too.
2. I prefer not to use liners, but rather just spray olive oil inside before adding my food for easier cleanups.

Let me give you a peek of my pretty thang I bought recently. It goes with my kitchen so I can just leave it out on the countertop all the time. 😉

Slow Cooker Puerto Rican Beef Stew

This time we are going to use our Crockpot, because that just makes my life easier. If you’d rather keep an eye on it for several hours on your stovetop in a large pot you could. If all of my machines were dirty I would instead follow our dutch oven stew timing and use these same ingredients for Puerto Rican stew in oven.

You could use any sort of red meat and cut it into bite size pieces for this. Stew meat is just easier, and cheaper, to use so that is my choice. I have had thick steaks that needed to be eaten though and used that, tasted just as great. You could even make a pork variety with a diced up roast.

Carne Guisada

Puerto Rican carne guisada is another name for it, the “proper name” if you will. Anyone can make it though, and you can tweak it to be just right for your own family. Love spicy dinners? Add your own favorite sauce to amp it up for that.

Puerto Rican Stewed Beef

Now when it comes to old fashioned dishes like this one there is a HUGE variety in the way people make it. My mom made everything super mild and without a lot of seasonings. Now that I am adult I use her base but amp it up a ton because I like LOTS of flavor, with just a tad of heat.

To get all the flavors in your pan after you brown the outsides it is best to deglaze your pan with a bit of broth or water. Use a wooden spoon to scrape everything off so you don’t throw away all that flavor. With this step your prep is going to be about 20 minutes, pretty fast if you ask me.

Mexican Beef Stew with Potatoes

Like I said, there is a huge variety of ingredients used depending on whom you’re talking to. Potatoes are a must for us but you could easily leave them out if you like. Sometimes I add peas like you see here but traditionally green olives are added (no go for us).

• Meat cut into bite size pieces
• Cornstarch will help to thicken the sauce and brown the meat
• 2 tsp adobo seasoning
• Olive oil
• Onion diced
• Minced garlic
• 1/4 c sofrito or salsa, you may have your own homemade sofrito recipe
• Beef broth is better than cups of water
• 1/4 c red wine
• Italian seasoning
• Tomato sauce
• A whole carrot peeled and sliced into thick dials
• Potatoes sliced into large chunks, you can leave the skin on
• Apple cider vinegar
• Sazon may be new to you but a great seasoning
• You could add a bay leaves if desired, remove before serving

You can make this in a dutch oven on your Traeger too. Follow our smoked stew timing for instructions. Jump to recipe below and let us know what you think. If you too swap out an ingredient or two for something else let us know below what worked best.

Dominican Beef Stew

For Dominican style you’d want to shred the meat at the end and include sliced peppers too. We do have a printable recipe card at the very bottom of this post. You can keep it handy or come back time and time again. We would be sad if we never saw you again so bookmark our page!

• In a large Ziplock bag mix the cornstarch, adobo and a pinch of salt and black pepper.
  • Add your meat in there, seal, and shake until all of the meat is evenly coated.
• Heat a large skillet over medium high heat, or dutch oven.
  • Add the oil to the skillet. Brown on all sides. Place the meat into the slow cooker.
  • Add diced or sliced onion and cook in the pan to soften, scrape the bottom to help deglaze the skillet.
• Add garlic and heat through. Then add the beef broth (or add water), scrape the bottom to remove any remaining pieces. Pour the contents of this skillet into your slow cooker.
• Add the tomato sauce, potatoes, carrots, and all remaining seasonings. Stir to combine. Cover and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours. When beef is tender add into bowls and serve.

Then serve as is or over a bed of rice. If you wanted to make this in a dutch oven instead you would follow the same instructions. Set pot over medium heat so it is slowly bubbling. Add lid and cook until tender which will be at least an hour, probably closer to 1 hour 30 minutes.

Love trying new flavors from different areas of the world? We have others and continue to add more each week so make sure you’re part of our email list below. Another PR dish is Guisado de Pollo using chicken thighs. Then try our Crockpot Brunswick stew and see which one is your family’s favorite one.