Dutch Winter Stew

Is it wrong to decide to make a recipe because it uses the most ugly vegetable (celeriac or céleri-rave in French) I've ever seen in the Metro around the corner? It also seemed like the perfect meal for a cold, gray, rainy day.

I stuck mostly to the recipe on this, but scaled down the amount of meat to slightly less than 0.5 kg (and scaled down the ground mustard accordingly). I had plenty of shallots on hand and only one onion left, so I switched to shallots. And because I had an open bottle of red wine with only one cup of wine left, I subbed that for beer. The wine (Saint-Emilion from Bordeaux) gave it an amazing smell while cooking ... 20 minutes into the cooking, I was starving!  Also, no fresh thyme on hand, so I used dried and I didn't see any celeriac leaves, so I threw in some bay leaves.

The end result?  A delicious, satisfying stew with just the right amount of veggies to balance the meat.
Dutch Winter Stew (from Kayotic Kitchen)
 
Ingredients
 
0.5 kg beef, cubed
1 shallot, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 celeriac root, chopped
1 leek, chopped
3 potatoes, chopped
1/2 tsp paprika
1 tbsp ground mustard
1 tbsp flour
1/2 tsp curry powder
1 cup beef broth
1 cup red wine
3 bay leaves
dried thyme
salt and pepper to taste
3 tbsp butter
 
1. In a small bowl, mix together flour, curry powder, and paprika.
2. Sprinkle salt and pepper on meat.  Cover in mustard powder.
3. Melt butter in a stew pot over medium heat.  Add in meat and cook for 5 minutes or so.
4. Add onions and cook for 2 minutes.  Add celeriac, carrots, and garlic and cook for an additional 3 minutes.
5. Sprinkle in flour mixture, coat and cook for 1 minutes.
6. Add wine, thyme, beef broth, and bay leaves.  Bring to a boil.  Cover and simmer at low heat for 75 minutes.
7. Add potatoes and leek and cook for an additional 45 minutes.