St. Patrick’s Day is a time when we enjoy corned beef and cabbage, green iced cookies, green frappes, and all sorts of treats. Aldi rotates all kinds of foods into its stores to help you celebrate St. Paddy’s Day. If it’s something savory you’re craving, I found some ready-to-heat Irish Beef Stew in the refrigerated aisle this week.
Irish stew typically includes root vegetables such as potatoes, carrots, and onions, along with lamb or mutton. It can also be made sometimes with beef or goat, but usually it’s the use of lamb or mutton that sets Irish stew apart from traditional beef stew.
I like beef stew. And while I cook a lot from scratch, this stew looked like just the thing to heat up easily and quickly on a busy weeknight. With certain family members rehearsing this week to march with a band in a local St. Patrick’s Day parade, this Irish beef stew seemed especially fitting to help get us in the proper celebratory mood.
Park Street Deli Irish Beef Stew is an Aldi Find, so it’s only in stores for a short time. Each store gets one shipment, and after that sells out, it’s gone unless Aldi decides to bring it back next year. Aldi does not offer online ordering for products that are not in stock at your local store.
This cost $9.99 for a 24-ounce package at the time of publication. That comes out to about 42 cents per ounce. With three servings per package, that’s about $3.33 per serving.
The package states this features “fully cooked beef with potatoes, onions, and carrots in gravy.”
The package I bought had a use-by date of almost two months out from my purchase date. If you don’t intend to serve it soon, you could probably freeze this.
Nutrition information, ingredients, and heating directions. (Click to enlarge.)
If you’re looking out for allergens, this contains milk and wheat.
This has a lot of sodium, which is not surprising for a ready-to-heat stew. It also has some fat and saturated fat. In addition, it contains some processed ingredients including maltodextrin, natural flavoring, and xanthan gum.
A one-cup serving has 260 calories, 10 grams of total fat (13% DV), 3 grams of saturated fat (15% DV), 800 mg of sodium (35% DV), 17 grams of total carbohydrates (6% DV), 2 grams of dietary fiber (7% DV), 3 grams of total sugars, 3 grams of added sugars (6% DV), and 24 grams of protein.
The package has directions for heating this in the microwave or on the stovetop.
To microwave, remove the outer sleeve from the tray. Open the pouch and pour the contents into a microwave-safe dish or bowl. Cover and microwave for 4 minutes. Remove from the microwave and stir. Microwave an additional 4 minutes. Remove and stir. Warm an additional 2 minutes. Remove and stir. Let rest for 5 minutes before serving.
To heat on the stove, heat water in a pot to a soft boil and place the bag in water for 20 minutes. Using tongs, remove the pouch from the pot. Let rest for 3 minutes before opening.
The stew in my saucepan.
I chose to heat this in a different way than what the directions indicate. I poured the pouch of stew directly into a saucepan and heated it on the stovetop, so I wasn’t boiling or microwaving a plastic bag. It took about 10 minutes to heat, and this contains whole potatoes, which took the longest to heat.
This had four whole potatoes, at least six or seven large pieces of tender beef, and a good amount of carrots. It also has a lot of gravy, making this ideal to serve with some crusty bread to help sop everything up. Our taste testers’ opinions on this stew ranged from okay to good. Some of us felt like it was a nice step up from a canned beef stew, while others weren’t so sure about that. I personally liked this.
The Verdict:
Park Street Deli Irish Beef Stew is a refrigerated, ready-to-heat stew featuring fully cooked beef, whole potatoes, onions, carrots, and gravy. It’s a savory meal that seems a little nicer than a canned beef stew. We recommend serving with bread to soak up the gravy.
