Scottish Beef & Dumplings Stew

This traditional Scottish beef and dumpling stew is a lovely recipe to cook up at this time of year. It’s a lovely recipe to warm up the family in the Autumn and Winter months. The melt in the mouth beef and vegetables is served up with helpings of the stew gravy and the delicious dough balls.

You can watch the full Scottish beef and dumplings recipe in the video below or in the recipe in this post. I hope you enjoy this delicious family favourite.

This recipe is made with some delicious Scotch beef but you could also try this recipe with lamb that would also work out really lovely. You can swap up the root vegetables a little bit too.

If you enjoy this type of recipe you may also enjoy my delicious beef shin stew its a melt in the mouth classic and is made in the slow cooker to save some time in the evening. I also love the traditional Irish mutton stew it is absolutely delicious and is listed below for you too. There are a few other delicious recipes over on my Youtube channel.

Tips for making this recipe:

  • as mentioned above you can make this recipe with the delicious Scotch beef or you could even try and make it with lamb or chicken thighs. I might have to try a chicken version for you sometime that sounds delicious.
  • keep your sides seasonal for maximum nutritional benefit. I love seasonal greens and freshly steamed vegetables or some roasted potato wedges work really well with this stew also.
  • the full recipe cooking time is 2 hours in total and the dumplings are to be added to the dish to cook for 30 minutes in the final hour of cooking. I just wanted to make sure you didn’t cook it for 2 hours and 30 minutes instead of the actual 2 hours it is meant to be.
  • you could try this in the slow cooker but you would have to adjust the times to suit.
  • if you love dumplings double up the dumpling recipe. The dumpling’s recipe makes 8 but if your feeding a large family you might need more. I know my kids could easily eat two dumplings each if I had available.

Scottish Beef and Dumpling Stew

  • 2 tbsp Plain Flour
  • 1 tsp Salt
  • 1 tsp Black pepper
  • 800g Beef Cubed (Approx)
  • 2 tbsp Butter
  • 2 Onions (chopped chunky)
  • 2 Carrots (chopped chunky)
  • 1/2 Neep (turnip) (chopped chunky)
  • 400 ml water (or beef / veg stock)

Dumplings

  • 110g Plain Flour
  • 1/2 tsp Baking Powder
  • 50g Beef Suet
  • Chopped Fresh Parsley (Handful)
  • Salt and Pepper
  • Water (Just enough to mix to dough)

  1. Preheat the oven to 140C (fan oven).

  2. Add the plain flour, salt and black pepper to a large mixing bowl and mix through.

  3. Add the beef into the bowl and mix through to coat.

  4. Melt the butter in a large oven proof cast iron pan or similiar.

  5. Add the beef and brown for around 10 minutes.

  6. Remove the beef once browned and set aside.

  7. Add all of the chopped vegetables into the pan the beef was cooking in and cook down for 5 mintues.

  8. Add in the water or stock and add the beef back into the pan.

  9. Stir through well and season with salt and pepper.

  10. Add a lid and cook in the oven for 1 hour.

  11. After the hour take out the dish and stir through. Remove the lid and place back in for another hour without the lid this time.

  12. While the stew is cooking for the final hour add all of the dumpling ingredients to a mixing bowl and mix through.

  13. Add a small amount of water to form a dough and split into 8 balls. Roll them in your hands.

  14. Remove the stew 30 minutes into the cooking and add in the dough balls as per the video above. Pop back into the oven for the last 30 minutes to cook the dough balls. Serve with seasonal vegetables.