Eurasian Beef Smore is a delicious, hearty beef stew with Asian and European flavours. It’s one of my favourite childhood recipes!
Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
What is a Eurasian?
Eurasian, as its name implies, is a mix of European and Asian. Generally speaking, in Singapore and Malaysia, Eurasian food is a mix of Asian food with a strong Portuguese influence, although the term Eurasian was initially coined for Anglo Indians in the time of the British Raj in India.
These days, with the countless intermarriages, the term encompasses all manner of Caucasian heritage.
You can read more about the various ethnic groups that make up the local populations of Singapore and Malaysia on my new blog: Singaporean and Malaysian Recipes.
Eurasian Beef Stew
You’ll see a strong resemblance to many European beef stews, but the Eurasian Beef Smore is a much darker version because of the added soy sauces and of course, you can’t miss the julienned ginger. It’s cooked with carrots and potatoes and is eaten with a plate of hot steaming white rice although my favourite method is with liberally buttered crusty bread or some mashed potatoes.
On a slight tangent, the picture below shows you a hotel on the banks of Malacca River or Sungei Melaka in Malay. Its architecture is very heavily Portuguese influenced, as is its name, Casa del Rio.
Scones in Eurasian Beef Smore
The traditional method of making the Eurasian Beef Smore is to crumble a scone or two (yes, really) at the end of the cooking, as a thickening agent. I omit this and go with the flour at the start method.
Another change I’ve made over the years is also to add more European style stew-friendly vegetables, namely leek and celery, stopping short of parsnip and swede, as those will alter the final taste tremendously. And we don’t want that!
Another thing that I’ve also done is to use sundried tomato paste instead of straight up tomato purée. Sundried tomato paste lends amazing depth to any recipe you use it in, and is a favourite and quite often, secret ingredient of mine.
Potatoes in Eurasian Beef Smore
A word on the potatoes. You can vary the amount depending on what you plan to serve it with. Naturally, use less spuds if you’re having it with mash. And, the more potatoes you have, the thicker the end result. Here, I’ve specified 4 potatoes which will give each diner about 4 quarters.
Another thing to remember is to cut the vegetable and meat to about the same size, ie., bite size. The leeks will naturally almost disappear but the rest should hold their shape.
Click here to read up on Soy Sauces if you’re not sure of the different kinds.
More Singaporean and Malaysian Recipes
You’ll find a growing range of recipes from these two countries on my new blog. Singaporean and Malaysian Recipes is, as its name suggests, going to be all about the food of mu childhood. It’ll also include the odd Indonesian recipe. All the recipes below are on that site:
Beef Rendang Bak Chor Mee Singapore Chilli Crab Roti John
Eurasian Beef Smore
Ingredients
- 500 g stewing beef diced to about 2.5cm/1 inch cubes
- 1 cinnamon stick
- 2 cloves
- 2 large onions quartered
- 4 cloves garlic sliced widthwise
- 7.5 cm ginger julienned (in strips)
- 1 large carrot chopped into similar sized chunks as the beef
- 1 celery chopped as above
- 1 leek also chopped to roughly the same size
- 2 tomatoes halved
- 4 medium potatoes quartered
- 1 tsp black peppercorns
- 1 tsp sundried tomato paste
- 2 Tbsp vegetable oil
- 1 Tbsp plain flour 2 if you’d like a slightly thicker stew
- 500 ml beef stock
- 500 ml water
- fresh coriander leaves cilantro, chopped, to serve
Marinade
- 1 Tbsp dark soy sauce
- 1 Tbsp kicap manis sweet soy sauce or 1 tbsp dark with ¼ tsp sugar
- dash of light soy sauce
- 2 tsp clear vinegar
- 1 tsp salt
- generous amount of freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- Marinade the beef with all the ingredients for about an hour.
- Then, heat the oil in a casserole dish or large saucepan on medium heat, and fry the cinnamon stick and cloves for 30 seconds.
- Add the onion, garlic and ginger and fry for a couple of minutes until softened but not brown.
- Add the beef, stir to mix and brown for a couple of minutes.
- Add the flour and stir thoroughly.
- Tip in the rest of the vegetables, apart from the potatoes. So carrot, celery, leek and tomatoes. Stir thoroughly to coat with meat juices. If you like your vegetables like carrots, leeks and celery less cooked, add them with the potatoes, step 8.
- Now add the stock, sundried tomato paste and black peppercorns. Stir and bring to boil.
- Cover and leave to simmer for about 1 and a half hours.
- Add the potatoes, bring to boil and cook until the potatoes are done, about 30 minutes, by which time, the beef will be done too. Remember, if you like your vegetables like carrots, leeks and celery less cooked, add them with the potatoes.
- Taste for seasoning and scatter coriander leaves all over and serve with rice, bread or mashed potato.
I am a 74 yr old Filipino Baba living in Singapore. My wife is Eurasian. I love Eurasian food.
Thank you for the Smore recipe. Easy to follow the recipe. Will try when my sons and their families come for dinner over the weekend.
Hi Renaldo, it’s a pleasure. Lovely to meet you, and do let me know how it goes. If there are any other Eurasian recipes you’d like to see, just drop me a line.
Can this beef smore be cooked in a slow cooker and for how long? It looks delicious. Thank you.
Hi Tina, yes, it can be cooked in a slow cooker like a regular beef and vegetable stew. On low, for 6-8 hours, depending on the size of your beef pieces. Use half the amount of stock.
Thanks for sharing !
A pleasure, Richard.
I blog quite often and I truly appreciate your content. This article has
truly peaked my interest. I am going to book mark your blog and keep checking for
new information about once a week. I opted in for your RSS feed
too.
Thank you, Elinor, I appreciate that. Let me know if there’s anything you’d like to see. Do you mean you have a blog too? I’d love to visit it.
OMG! I haven’t had this since I left Singapore over 20 years ago! Thank you, thank you, thank you! I am going to make this over the weekend for the family. Thank you for a wonderful explanation of the recipe and also the additions that you have made. I think I will go with your recipe exactly! Have subscribed!
A pleasure, thank you Tracy. How did you go and what did you think of it?
And thank you for subscribing!
I saw this post on Facebook and had to come over to take a look! What a fantastic recipe, definitely more substantial that I remember eating it as a child in Singapore. My mum’s was always a bit more watery, but I really like the idea of the extra vegetables! Thank you, Azlin, from a fellow Singaporean Eurasian!
You are very welcome, Emilia, and I really appreciate you leaving me a comment!
Thank you, Azlin. I remember eating this in my grandmother’s house almost every Sunday when we visited! This looks really good and I love all your own touches here, like the added vegetables and the sundried tomato paste.
I made this for dinner yesterday exactly as you have written here and the whole family is just in love with it, including my mum who is visiting from Singapore. She’s asked me to print your recipe so she can take it home!
I am saving this recipe!
Awesome, thank you so much! I appreciate you taking the time to leave me a comment and letting me know. Tell your mum I love her, she just made my day! x
Being a Singapore Eurasian with a true blue Portuguese Grandmother, Beef S’more was a family traditional dish. Thank you for sharing this recipe. I’ll treasure/share it!
Hey Naomi, a pleasure, I really appreciate you taking the time to leave me a comment. And for treasuring and sharing it!
This is truly awesome, man. I was doing a search for Eurasian recipes and this came up. I’m so glad I found your website, so many recipes back home for this single Malaysian in Toronto to make! I am slowly planning to look at all your recipes. Have subscribed!
Thank you so much, Terence, let me know if there’s anything you’d like to see!
Thank you will definitely be trying this stew can’t wait
Thank you Felix, sorry I missed your comment earlier!