Boeuf Bourguignon

Snuggle up

As winter draws in, minds and mouths hanker after soothing stews. Boeuf bourguignon is beef stew raised to the level of high art. By Anna Trapido.

 

The classic boeuf bourguignon recipe calls for a hearty slosh of red Burgundy in the sauce. If your palate and wallet recoil at the idea of pouring a real Burgundy from Burgundy into your stew, a good-quality local Pinot Noir will offer up equivalently earthy, aromatic elements.

The aptly named Joel Fleischman recently wrote in Vanity Fair that "Pinot Noir is the most romantic of wines with so voluptuous a perfume, so sweet an edge and so powerful a punch that, like falling in love, it makes the blood run hot and the soul wax embarrassingly poetic."

In order to avoid becoming an embarrassment it's probably best to keep in mind Julie Powell's experience with Julia Child's boeuf bourguignon recipe. In her blog (which subsequently became the inspiration for the film Julie and Julia) she wrote, "Boeuf bourguignon is pretty fun to make... I had a couple of vodka tonics.

Maybe one might better say ‘a few'... I brought it to a simmer on top of the stove, then stuck it back in the oven. This is where things begin to fall apart. Because, see, the boeuf bourguignon is meant to cook three to four hours, and it was already after 10 o'clock.

So I figured I'd sit around and drink another vodka tonic and wait. Only it turns out drinking vodka tonics is not the best idea when sitting around waiting for your beef to cook. I began to get very, very sleepy, very, very quickly.

Oh, that's okay, I thought. I'll just get up when the alarm goes off and take it out. I got ready for bed and lay down on the bed. I woke up at four o'clock in the morning. The boeuf bourguignon was toast." Clearly the moral of Julie's story is that one should only drink Pinot Noir while cooking boeuf bourguignon!

STEW
170g un-sliced bacon
1 T olive oil
1.3kg lean stewing beef, cubed
1 carrot, peeled and sliced
1 onion, peeled and sliced
1 t salt
¼ t pepper, freshly ground
2 T flour
3 cups Pinot Noir
2-3 cups beef stock
1 T tomato paste
2 garlic cloves, crushed
1 sprig thyme and 1 bay leaf

BRAISED ONIONS
24 pearl onions, peeled
1½ T butter
2 T olive oil
½ cup beef stock
salt and freshly ground pepper

SAUTÉED MUSHROOMS
340g mushrooms, quartered
2 T butter
1 T olive oil

Pre-heat the oven to 160ºC. Cut the bacon into one-centimetre lardon chunks and simmer in 1.5 litres of water for approximately 10 minutes until cooked through. Drain and discard the water.

Heat a casserole dish on top of the stove. Sauté the oil and bacon until golden, remove with a slotted spoon and set aside. Sauté the beef in the oil and bacon fat until browned and set aside with the bacon. In the same oil/fat, sauté the onion and carrot, then pour off the excess fat and return the meats to the casserole with the carrots and onion.

Add the tomato paste, garlic, herbs, salt, pepper and flour and mix well. Add the wine and stock and bring to the boil. Cover the stew, place it in the oven and cook for approximately three hours until the meat is tender.

While the meat is cooking, heat the butter and oil in a frying pan and sauté the onions until golden. Pour in the stock, salt and pepper. Cover and simmer until the onions are tender but retain their shape. In a second pan, heat the remaining butter and oil and sauté the mushrooms.

When the meat is tender, remove the casserole from the oven and strain the sauce. Return the meat to the casserole dish. Discard vegetables that remain behind in the sieve. Skim the fat off the sauce and return to the pot. If the sauce is too thick, add stock. Finally top with mushrooms and onions.