One Pot Irish Lamb Stew Recipe with Vegetables

One-pot Irish Lamb stew has melt-in-mouth tender chunks of lamb with hearty potatoes and carrots cooked in Instant Pot bone broth. This stew is made in one pot, it’s warm, hearty, comforting, and perfect for dunking crusty bread.

Have you tried chicken afritada (Filipino chicken stew), spiced ground lamb with potatoes?

Jump to:

• Irish lamb stew recipe
• Ingredients
• What cut of lamb is best for stew?
• Step by step instructions
• How to make it in Instant Pot
• How to make in crock pot
• Expert Tips
• Recipe FAQs
• Other related recipes
• 📋One Pot Lamb Stew

Irish lamb stew recipe

Meltingly tender meat of lamb cooked with carrots, onions, and potatoes in deeply flavored gravy or broth…IRRESISTIBLE!

This hearty and most comforting stew is a meal in itself. All you need is crusty bread to dunk in the rich gravy that’s ridiculously delicious! I don’t mind serving the stew with steamed rice. I guess I love this combo just because I’m a huge rice fan.

This stew is truly bagged with flavors. Bacon cubes are browned in a pan, and boneless lamb shoulder is coated and flour and browned in bacon fat. The pot is braised with chicken bone broth along with other flavoring agents in which carrots and potatoes along with braised meat are cooked slowly until tender. Slow cooking results in thick and rich gravy-like broth. Everything is cooked in one pot, which helps trap in all the flavors.

Don’t use two pans. Some use a shallow Dutch oven to brown bacon and lamb pieces and a large Dutch oven to cook vegetables in the broth. Between the two pot you tend to loose some of the flavors.

Those little brown bits left in the pan after browning the meat – those are GOLDEN! It’s packed with flavors. Don’t lose those.

Serve stew with your favorite crusty bread like soda bread, or sourdough bread.

Ingredients

Here’s what you’ll need –

Ingredients notes:

1. Bacon – I used thick bacon cubes. You may also use pork cubes. Streaky bacon strips are preferred ingredients usually.
2. Lamb – use boneless lamb shoulder to get tender, melt-in-mouth lamb once cooked. Shop for boneless lamb shoulder, trimmed for fat and cut into 1 ½ inch cubes. You can use a mix of lamb shoulder and lamb leg for stew.
3. Flour – use all-purpose flour to coat the lamb and sear it in the pan. The flour helps the lamb brown well without breaking and helps thicken the broth. No need to make roux separately (that’ll thicken the stew), the flour coating on the lamb and the flour that remains in the pan will help as a thickening agent.
4. Salt & pepper – use as required. Add it to the flour mix to season lamb and use it in gravy as per taste.
5. Onion – adds aroma and flavor to the broth/gravy. Use yellow or white onion diced into cubes.
6. Garlic – adds flavor and aroma to the stew. Use fresh minced garlic for best results, garlic powder won’t have the same taste.
7. Bay leaf – adds wonderful flavor to the stew.
8. Vegetables – feel free to use any vegetable of your choice in the stew. I used carrots and potatoes.
9. Broth – I used chicken bone broth. Beef broth works great.
10. Red wine – use soft red wine such as Ste Chappell or Pinot Noir. Wine is used to deglaze the pan to help release the aromatics that are stuck to the pan, making the gravy rich and flavorful.
11. Fresh herbs – I used fresh thyme and fresh rosemary to flavor and garnish the stew. You may use dried thyme and dried rosemary. Garnish the soup with parsley if you like.

Ingredients additions and substitutions

Stews are easy to customize as per your preference. You can add other ingredients to make the stew the way you like it. Try any of these-

• Bacon cubes may be substituted with streaky bacon or pork cubes.
• Add other vegetables to make nutritious stew. You can include green beans, mushrooms, and parsnips. Also, consider adding frozen peas towards the end of the cooking stew.
• Stir in a tablespoon of tomato paste when you sauté onion and garlic. You can also use canned diced tomatoes to the stew.
• Beef broth works as great substitute for chicken broth.
• I highly recommend you use fresh herbs. If you can’t get fresh herbs, use Italian seasoning as a substitute.
• Red wine is great for making this stew. For traditional flavor, you can try Irish Stout or Guinness beer.

What cut of lamb is best for stew?

Some butcher shop usually sells stew meat separately. It’s usually the leg of lamb or the shoulder of lamb. Shop for boneless lamb shoulder cut into small cubes. You can use a mix of lamb shoulder and lamb leg for stew.

Step by step instructions

Note: I did not finish off the stew in the oven in the last. I found the consistency of the meat was melting in my mouth and the gravy was wonderfully thick with loads of flavors. Cooked perfectly. If you want to finish off in the oven, add carrots and potatoes and make sure it’s fully submerged in liquid. Cover with aluminum foil, and pop the Dutch oven into a preheated oven at 375 degrees F for about an hour or until lamb and potatoes are tender.

Serve this melting-in-mouth lamb meat stew garnished with fresh thyme leaves, fresh parsley along with crusty bread on the side.

How to make it in Instant Pot

1. Select sauté mode on the instant pot. Add bacon bits and fry until browned. Remove fried bacon with a slotted spoon leaving behind bacon grease.
2. While bacon cooks, season lamb meat with salt, pepper, and flour. Coat lamb meat evenly in flour.
3. Add lamb meat to hot bacon grease in one single layer. Cook it for 3-4 minutes or until browned well on all sides. Remove browned lamb meat onto a plate. If you’re doing in batches brown all lamb meat.
4. Add onions, garlic, fresh thyme, and fresh rosemary, and sauté for a few minutes. Add back bacon and browned lamb meat. Pour in all broth. Stir and mix well.
5. Put the lid on the Instant Pot and lock the lid. Switch it to the Stew/Meat setting and program it for 20 minutes.
6. While the stew cooks, prep the vegetables. Peel carrots and potatoes. Dice into roughly 1-inch pieces.
7. Once cooking time is over, manually release all steam with quick release. Add vegetables, remaining herbs like fresh thyme, fresh rosemary, bay leaf, red wine, and salt and pepper as required. Cover with lid. Select manual mode and set the cooking time to 10 minutes.
8. After cooking time is over, let the pot release all its steam manually (unless you are in a rush to serve stew immediately).
9. Serve stew warm with crusty bread.

How to make in crock pot

Season lamb with salt, pepper, and flour. Coat flour evenly. Heat canola oil in a Dutch oven. Brown seasoned lamb meat in oil. Remove browned lamb into slow cooker.

Add onions, garlic, diced carrots, potatoes, fresh thyme, fresh rosemary, and bay leaf . Pour in broth. Cover and cook for 6 hours stir occasionally.

Serve with crusty bread.

Expert Tips

1. The key to a more flavorful stew – coating lamb in flour before you sear until brown. Season it properly with salt and pepper along with flour to make the stew more flavorful.
2. Do not add vegetables in the beginning. Vegetables will overcook in the stew turning mushy, which isn’t great.
3. Along with onions and garlic, add half of fresh thyme and rosemary mentioned in the recipe. Sautéing fresh herbs along with onions and garlic will release out amazing flavors of the herbs.
4. You can deglaze the pan with red wine, broth, or Guinness.
5. When adding liquid to the deglaze pan, add a little and scrape out all the brown bits. It’s packed with flavors.

Recipe FAQs