:A Different Kind of French Beef Stew
Beef Bourguignon is Steuart’s all-time best, never-fail crowd pleaser,
but he makes it all the time. Poor me.
For a Sunday night dinner with a couple of friends, he wanted to try
something different. But thwarting him was a big piece of beef- the last
of our cow from Pure Wyoming Beef
— waiting, thawed in the refrigerator.
Daube de Boeuf a la Provencial.
Marinate 3 lbs of beef cubes in 1.5 cups of dry white wine, or a light
red, 2 T olive oil, salt, pepper, thyme, bay leaf, mashed garlic, 2 cups
of thin-sliced onions, 2 cups of thin sliced carrots. At least 3 hours
(refrigerate if you’re going to leave them longer).
Noon on Sunday: Preheat oven 300 F.
If your bacon is salty, boil it for a few minutes to remove salt. Chop 1lb of mushrooms and 1lb of tomatoes. Drain the meat in a sieve. Line bottom of casserole or LeCruset with bacon, add a layer of marinade and newly chopped vegetable in the casserole, roll the beef cubes in flour and layer them on, add another layer of bacon and repeat until casserole is full or ingredients are exhausted. Pour the marinade and some beef stock over it all until liquid nearly comes to the top of the casserole.
Cook for about 4 hours.
Skim the fat of the top with a baster.
Using a fork mash ten anchovies and 2 T. capers to a paste. See first photo. Then add to 3 t. wine vinegar, 2 closes of garlic mashed, 1/4 cup minced parsley.
Add this to the casserole and put back in your low temp oven until ready to serve.
It’s amazingly different from the rich beef stew from Burgundy.
We served it with roast potatoes, peas and a green salad. Plenty for everyone and left overs, too.
Wine to go with: an Argentinian Malbec was incredible. We also tried a durif from South Africa — not so good. Hearty was surprisingly better. The third bottle, a Zinfandel, went down just fine too.
For dessert — a gluten free coconut cake. Now that’s another story.