Garlic Lover’s Crockpot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes (Video)

The generous amount of garlic is sweet and delicious in this Garlic Lover’s Crockpot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes. And this delicious stew is low-glycemic, gluten-free, dairy-free, South Beach Diet Phase One, and can easily be Paleo or Whole 30 approved. Use the Diet-Type Index to find more recipes like this one.

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Garlic Lover’s CrockPot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes!

I have so many cookbooks that invariably a book I really like gets pushed to the bottom of the pile, and later I rediscover it. That’s exactly what happened when I made this Garlic Lover’s Crockpot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes, inspired by a recipe from  The Olive and the Caper, a book about Greek Cooking written by Susanna Hoffman.The inspiring recipe calls for 100 cloves of garlic, and although I used less than that, this is a stew for people who really like the flavor of slow-cooked garlic.   If you’ve never had garlic that’s been cooked for a long time, it’s sweet and delicious, and this stew smelled amazing while it was cooking.

Besides the garlic, there are Kalamata Olives, capers, bay leaves, Greek Oregano, and a touch of red-wine vinegar adding a lot of flavor to the tomato-based stew.  I cooked this on high for a little over four hours, but if you’re looking for something that can cook on low all day, this recipe would be perfect for that.  I do recommend browning the beef, which you can do the night before and keep it in a container in the fridge overnight, just in case daylight savings time is making your mornings a little more rushed than usual!

Cut the beef into 1 inch pieces and brown well in olive oil.  Prepare one cup each of sliced Kalamata Olives and Garlic Cloves.  (I used peeled Christopher Ranch Garlic Cloves for the garlic, which made it easy.)

Deglaze the pan with the beef stock and then simmer until it’s reduced to 3/4 cup.  Gather the capers, bay leaves, diced tomato, tomato sauce, tomato paste, red wine vinegar, and also some Greek Oregano (which didn’t make it into the photo!)  You can do all this preparation the night before and keep ingredients in the fridge in a covered container if your mornings are busy.

Here’s the stew at the beginning of the cooking time and how it looked when it was done.

So, so delicious; hope you will try it if you like garlic. For a tasty low-carb meal I’d love this with Pureed Cauliflower with Garlic, Parmesan, and Goat Cheese.

More Recipes for Garlic Lovers:

World’s Easiest Garlicky Green Beans Stir-Fry ~ Kalyn’s Kitchen
Steamed Shrimp with Garlic Oil from Rasa Malaysia
Roasted Broccoli with Garlic ~ Kalyn’s Kitchen
Garlic-Lover’s White Bean Soup from Farmgirl Fare
Cauliflower with Garlic and Lemon ~ Kalyn’s Kitchen

Weekend Food Prep:

This recipe has been added to a new category called Weekend Food Prep  to help you find recipes you can prep or cook on the weekend and eat during the week!

Print Recipe

Garlic Lover’s Crockpot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes

Yield: 4-6 servings

Total Time: 4 hours 30 minutes

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Cook Time: 4 hours on high

The generous amount of garlic is sweet and delicious in this Garlic Lover’s Crockpot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes.

Ingredients:

• 2-3 lb. beef chuck roast, cut into pieces about 1 inch (I used 2 1/2 cups beef cubes)
• 1-2 T olive oil (for browning beef)
• 1 can reduced-sodium beef broth (or use 1 1/2 cups homemade beef stock)
• 1 cup garlic cloves, peeled and cut into lengthwise slivers
• 1 cup Kalamata Olives, cut in half lengthwise
• 2 T capers, rinsed
• 3 bay leaves
• 1 tsp. dried Greek oregano
• 1 can (14.5 oz.) diced tomatoes with juice
• 1 small can (8 oz.) tomato sauce
• 2 T tomato paste (optional, but it does bump up the tomato flavor)
• 3 T red wine vinegar
• fresh ground black pepper to taste

Directions:

1. In heavy frying pan, heat 1 T oil over medium-high heat and brown half of beef cubes, turning several times so it’s well browned on all sides. Put beef in crockpot and brown the rest of beef, adding more oil if needed. Put second batch of browned beef cubes in crockpot.
2. Add beef broth (or homemade beef stock) to frying pan, scraping up any browned bits from the bottom of the pan, and simmer until beef broth is reduced to 3/4 cup. Add reduced broth to crockpot.
3. While beef is browning, cut the garlic into slices and cut the Kalamata Olives in half.
4. Add garlic and olives to crockpot along with rinsed capers, bay leaves, oregano, canned tomatoes and juice, tomato sauce, tomato paste (if using), red wine vinegar, and pepper.
5. Cook on high for about 4 hours or a little longer, until meat is tender and flavors are well blended. (This could also be cooked in the slow cooker on low for 8-9 hours.)
6. Serve hot.

Notes:

I used my Crock-Pot 3-1/2-Quart Slow Cooker for this recipe, but it could have been a little smaller.  This freezes really well, so if you only have a big slow cooker I’d just double the recipe.  You could also cook this on top of the stove in a heavy dutch oven if you have a stove that will simmer at very low heat. I haven’t made it on the stove, so I don’t know exactly how long the cooking time would be.

Recipe adapted from The Olive and the Caper by Susanna Hoffman.

All images and text ©Kalyn Denny for Kalyn's Kitchen.

Low-Carb Diet / Low-Glycemic Diet / South Beach Diet Suggestions:
Served alone, this Garlic Lover’s Crockpot Beef Stew with Olives, Capers, and Tomatoes is a perfect main dish for a low-glycemic eating plan or any phase of the South Beach Diet. With approved ingredient choices it’s also Paleo or Whole 30 approved.

Find More Recipes Like This One:
Use the Recipes by Diet Type photo index pages to find more recipes suitable for a specific eating plan. You might also like to Follow Kalyn’s Kitchen on Pinterest to see all the good recipes I’m sharing there. You can also fine more Slow Cooker / Pressure Cooker Recipes on my other site!

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