Natalie Reebel
This beef and Guinness pie is beautiful yet rustic with a flavor that’s full and rich. The vegetables cook up nice and tender but still retain some color and shape. The feel of the stew is silky but so satisfying, and the beef is fork-tender. The puff pastry is a wonderful bonus as it’s buttery but so easy to place on top. I made the pie filling the evening before so we’d have a wonderful dinner to come home to on a Monday evening.
The Guinness, A.1., and Worcestershire blend so well together and add an amazing depth to the sauce. This recipe is wonderful for a family dinner, company, or a cold evening in great need of comfort food. It was delicious.
Joan Osborne
This beef and Guinness pie recipe was delicious. I’ll definitely be making this one again. I only had one problem with this recipe: even after cooking it for over an hour, the liquid didn’t get as thick as I like for a pot pie. Next time I’ll add a bit of cornstarch if it doesn’t thicken. This was still a big hit at my house. We loved it. The flavors were fantastic. It made a great Sunday supper on a cold winter night.
This beef and Guinness pie recipe was clear and worked well for me. I thought that when the pie filling was cooked it might need sweetening with sugar (as has previously happened when I cooked with Guinness), but I found the filling just needed a little seasoning with salt and pepper. This was presumably because the Guinness in this recipe is cooked for an hour, which is long enough to allow the bitterness to cook off.
If the pie filling is a little too watery after cooking it, then some more flour can be added to thicken the sauce a little before putting the filling in the pie dish. I’d recommend using store-bought all-butter puff pastry [EDITOR’S NOTE: Dufour is the brand we prefer], which has a good taste and is easy to use.
I thought that the temperature of the oven was a little too high, as the pastry colored up very quickly—after about 25 minutes—but the pie filling wasn’t quite up to temperature so I’d suggest a slightly lower temperature and checking occasionally to ensure that the pastry isn’t burning.
Steve Dunn
If you happen to be hunkered down during a blizzard anytime soon, reach for this beef and Guinness pie—it won’t disappoint. That’s what we did last night as we settled in for the “Blizzard of 2013″ here in the Northeast, and this dish kept us happy and warm as the storm raged outside. After an hour on the flame, the flavors had concentrated nicely.
That said, I did find the stew still too thin for my liking even after the full hour of cooking, and so I added a cornstarch slurry (about 2 tablespoons worth) which thickened the stew nicely to a rich, glossy sheen. I used a mix of fresh rosemary, thyme, and oregano, and they blended beautifully with the sweet, malty flavor of the Guinness.
I had some A.1. on hand (which was actually a bit of a shock to me), so I used it as called for along with the Worcestershire, and they contributed to a great depth of flavor in the dish. I used a very lean beef stew meat (it was all I could get at my local market), and would like this dish even more with a fattier, more tender cut of meat. The next time I make this, I’ll look for a cut of beef with better marbling. In fact, though it’d be flying in the face of tradition, I bet this pie would be fabulous with cubed pork shoulder.
I did encounter a bit of trouble with the puff pastry crust (I bought some premade frozen puff pastry at Trader Joes) because it didn’t rise AT ALL when baking. Not sure if it was due to altitude issues (we’re at our ski house in Vermont) or a problem with the pastry itself. The flavor of the crust was quite good, but it was a fairly dense barrier to the goodness underneath. I served the pie up with a crisp green salad and some simple Cheddar mashed potatoes to raves from around the table.
