There's the full-on Julia Child's version, then there's my busy-working-woman-with-no-time-and-a-very-small-kitchen version.
Essential ingredients are basically the same - beef, a full-bodied red wine, bacon, onions and mushrooms. Omit the oven and enter the slow cooker for pain-free cooking.
This is the kind of dish you start in the late morning, leave it in the slow cooker and go do other things, then come back to it an hour before dinner for the final prep. A throw-together-and forget-about-it kind of dish.
Today, I'm a lazy-ass. And since it's just dinner for 2 with Miss Z, I'm skipping mashing the potatoes, and throwing them into the stew instead, along with celery, for a one-dish meal.
Serves 4:
- 10 rashers of bacon, sliced
- 600g of lean stewing beef, cubed
- 1 carrot, sliced into half-inch slices
- 1 white onion, finely diced
- 2 tablespoons plain flour
- 1 bottle red wine (Bordeaux, Burgundy or a Beaujolais is good)
- 1 beef stock cube
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- 1 clove garlic, finely minced
- 1 stalk fresh thyme, leaves only
- 2 bay leaves
- 1 teaspoon wholegrain mustard
- 1 teaspoon dijon mustard
- 300g button mushrooms, quartered
- 10 small pearl or small white onions, peeled and left whole
- Freshly ground salt and pepper to taste
In a large pot, saute the bacon in 2 tablespoons of olive oil till brown and crisp over high heat. Remove from oil and set aside.
Pat dry the beef cubes, damp beef will not brown nicely. In the oil and bacon fat, sear the beef till browned and sealed, and set aside.
In the same fat, saute the onions till soft and translucent, then add the carrots and saute for a futher few minutes. Add the beef and bacon back to the pot, sprinkle on the flour and mix well, letting cook for a further 3 minutes.
Pour the entire bottle of wine in, topping up with some water to make sure the ingredients are just barely covered. Add tomato paste, garlic, stock cube, mustards and herbs to the stew and mix well. bring to a boil, then turn heat down to a low simmer for 3 hours. At this point, you can also transfer to a slow cooker set on high.
3 hours later, stir in the mushrooms and onions and simmer for another 1 hour. By this time, the stock would have reduced to a thick gravy. To serve, spoon a mound of mashed potatoes into a shallow bowl making a deep well in the centre and ladle a generous serving of stew into the well. Crusty garlic bread is also great for mopping up the thick sauce.
Other items on the Red, White and Ooohhh menu:
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