Cold Weather Means Stew

I decided tonight was the night for me to start to do stews. I've been in denial that the cold weather is upon us. (That could partially be due to the fact that I accidentally donated my new winter coat with all of my family's hand me downs at the end of last season and I'm still searching for a new one - but...)

I still had some stewing beef in the freezer from Langview Farms and had everything else I needed in the fridge. Beef Bourguignon it is!

As the Lunch Tramp is getting ready to once again start feeding the public at the soon to be opened Dish...Real Food Shop located in downtown Cornwall, I'm in full-on recipe testing mode. Unfortunately, that means I'm not quite as vigilant at photo taking - but the good news is the stew was REALLY good.

I'm not gonna lie to you. My intention was to make Julia Child's recipe - and that's basically what this was, albeit without the pearl onions and using pancetta instead of bacon. Also, I thought I had tomato paste in the cupboard but I did not - so there was none in the stew. I absolutely encourage you to try Julia's recipe. There's no question it is amazing in every possible way and I wasn't trying to change it to do anything more than actually get to make this without running out to buy the things I thought I had but didn't.

• pancetta (about 6 ounces)
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 3 pounds lean stew beef, cut into 2-inch cubes
• 1  carrot, chopped
• 1  onion, diced
• Salt and pepper
• 4 tablespoons flour
• 3 cups red wine (I used a Shiraz)
• 1 cup beef stock
• 3 cloves garlic, crushed
• 1 tablespoon fresh thyme
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 1 pound fresh mushrooms, quartered

Preheat oven to 450 degrees. 

I cubed the pancetta and added it to a casserole with 1 tablespoon olive oil and took it out with a slotted spoon.

Heat the oil and fat in pot. Again, for the interest of full disclosure, I did not dry the beef with paper towels (as Julia instructs) but did sauté on all sides until browned. In the same fat, I browned the onions and carrots. 

I returned the beef and pancetta to the pot and tossed with salt and pepper. Then I sprinkled on the flour and tossed again to coat the beef lightly. (Julia uses less flour but I didn't think there was enough to coat so I added more.) I set the pot uncovered in middle position of preheated oven for 4ish minutes. I tossed the meat again and return to oven for 4 minutes (this was supposed to brown the flour and cover the meat with a light crust. It did not.). 

At this point, I took the pot out and turned the oven down to 325 degrees. Add in wine (I used the whole bottle) and stock. Add the garlic and thyme. Bring to a simmer. Cover pot and set in lower third of oven for 3 to 4 hours. The meat is done when a fork pierces it easily. (This happened for me at just over 2 hours.)

 

When the beef is nearly done, sauté mushrooms in 2 tablespoons butter. (Had I been using the pearl onions she uses, I'd have cooked them for about an hour first.)

 

At this point, Julia has you strain the liquid. I did not do this. The sauce was thick enough that I did not have to cook it down. 

I'm not sure if you can tell by these pictures that the sauce was thick without being overly thick. The original recipe does call for more stock, although she does use a lot of it for the pearl onions which I didn't use. 

My kids aren't very big on "sauce" and we tend to give them things with all of scraped off. Tonight was no exception. However, they totally lost out because this was REALLY really good.

I served it with some Smashed Yukon Gold Potatoes.