Low-Calorie Beef Bourguignon recipe – unofficial Slimming World recipe
Beef bourguignon, sometimes called boeuf bourguignon, is a popular dish that can often be high in calories. This is due to using fatty beef and fatty bacon along with the wine. However, this low-calorie beef bourguignon is much better than most recipes.
Just Average Jen is an independent blog not connected with any weight loss plan. Please check nutritional values and/or syns yourself.
Choosing the best ingredients for this recipe
To ensure this recipe is made as low-calorie as possible choosing the right ingredients is key.
If you follow Slimming World, Weight Watchers (WW), Noom or any other weight loss plan you can usually count the ingredients within this recipe in your allowances.
It is of course important to check yourself for any plan you follow and remember all nutritional information and ingredients are found in the recipe card below.
When choosing beef for this beef bourguignon you need stewing beef as it is cooked slowly.
This is usually cheaper than the cuts used for steak and so is easy to find. Choose the leanest beef you can find.
Frozen beef works just as well in this recipe but be sure it is lean beef and defrost thoroughly before you cook it so that you can cut off any further visible fat for the leanest possible recipe.
The bacon you use in this recipe should also be lean. As you are chopping the bacon roughly for the recipe you should ensure all rind is removed and any fat running through the rasher is also removed.
The red wine you use in this recipe will be cooked so any alcohol in the wine is cooked off. For this reason, it is best to choose a low-alcohol wine.
What should you enjoy the beef bourguignon with?
This recipe is great to enjoy on its own. Otherwise making some mashed potatoes or boiled potatoes is easy and works well with the beef. The ultimate comfort food!
Some steamed broccoli would also look and taste lovely with the bourguignon. Really though the choice is yours what you have with it as it goes well with most things.
Enjoying this beef bourguignon on Slimming World
This is not a syn free recipe but that does not mean you can not enjoy it on Slimming World.
Everyone has a syn allowance which you can find more about in my beginners Slimming World guide and this fits comfortably within that, unlike higher fat versions.
The wine in the recipe has a total of around 15 syns and the flour used in the recipe is 2 syns so the recipe as a whole is around 4-4.5 syns per portion.
This leaves you plenty of syns left to share the remainder of the bottle of red wine if you wish!
Other recipes you are sure to love
If you love cooking with beef then here are a few other recipes you might like:
Taco beef stuffed sweet potato
One pot Beef Bourguignon or Boeuf Bourguignon
- Prep Time: 45 minutes
- Cook Time: 105 minutes
- Total Time: 2 hours 30 minutes
- Yield: 4 Portions 1x
- Category: Main Meal
- Method: Stove top, hob
- Cuisine: French
- Diet: Low Calorie
Description
A tasty beef bourguignon recipe perfect for all the family
Ingredients
low-calorie cooking spray
100g lean back bacon, all fat removed and chopped roughly
400g lean stewing beef, visible fat removed
3 Garlic cloves, sliced thinly
1 tbsp plain flour
375ml Red wine
200ml vegetable stock
1 tbsp tomato puree
2 large carrots, peeled and thickly sliced
1 large onion, sliced
250g mushrooms, halved
4 sprigs of fresh thyme
1 bay leaf
1cm wide strip of orange zest
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
Heat a large casserole pan over medium heat sprayed with low-calorie cooking spray.
Add the bacon (roughly chopped) and fry for 15 minutes until browned and crispy. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside.
Wipe out the casserole pan with kitchen paper to remove any excess fat from the bacon.
Season the beef and spray with more low-calorie cooking spray then brown in the casserole dish. It does not need to be cooked through, just browned on all sides.
Remove the beef from the casserole pan and set aside.
Saute the garlic in the pan for one minute then return the beef to the pan, stir in the flour and cook for 2-3 minutes.
Pour in the wine and deglaze the pan by scraping any bits stuck to the bottom with a wooden spatula.
Allow the wine to bubble gently for 5 minutes as it reduces.
Add the stock and tomato puree and stir thoroughly.
Add the mushrooms, onions, carrots bacon, thyme, orange zest and bay leaf and bring to the boil.
Reduce the heat and simmer for 75 minutes, stirring occasionally
Then partially cover the pan with a loose lid and allow to simmer for a further 30 minutes until tender and the sauce has nicely reduced. If the stew appears to be dry add a little more stock during this time, it probably just means the heat has been slightly higher than necessary but don’t worry it won’t affect the end result.
Remove the thyme stems and bay leaf before serving.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: 1 Portion
- Calories: 391
- Sugar: 10.6 g
- Sodium: 379.5 mg
- Fat: 13.5 g
- Saturated Fat: 4.9 g
- Trans Fat: 0.1 g
- Carbohydrates: 22.1 g
- Protein: 28.8 g
This looks lush! Is it possible to work out the Syn value for Slimming World programme?
My partner and I managed to devour the entire meal between just the two of us – oops! Having said that, it was worth it. Really tasty. Could it be done in the slow cooker?