Beef with stout
Well I must confess that a year is a little longer than I'd anticipated between blog updates. My legions of devoted foodie fans have been vocal in their disapproval (my mum said I should start again) and so here we are. It's been a busy year. Weepix and I have left Sydney and moved to the Central Coast (more on that later) due to work related shenanigans that see us travelling for up to twenty hours a week, hence the lack of blog activity. The downside of this is the loss of daily access to all the food related wonders that Sydney has to offer (which we are feeling acutely). The upside is we're cooking an awful lot more often as the temptation of 'let's just grab some Thai' is no longer there. So plenty of blog fodder. There have been litres of stock produced, ice cream made, absurdly good steak prepared, cheesecake perfected and a pork pie incident.
On that note, let's dive right in.
Any recipe that starts with 'fry your pancetta in the butter until the fat runs' is a solid gold promise of tasty things to come. It's also potentially a nod toward heart disease, high cholesterol and diabetes, but as long as we don't start all our recipes like this then it's an acceptable risk. The recipe in question is a Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall one for Beef In Stout (page 288 of 'Meat'). As Hugh points out it's a particularly good recipe if you don't have any beef stock (more on that later too) on hand but still fancy something with great depth of flavour and that provides a perfect excuse for a good bottle of red.....as if such an excuse is ever really needed. It's dead simple and freezes amazingly well (it actually seems better after it's been frozen for a while) so it's worth making a large batch. This serves 8-10.
- 1.5kg of chuck, rump or shin (stewing beef) - trimmed and shopped into large chunks.
- 250g of slat pork, pancetta or bacon - chopped into chunks or squares.
- 50g of butter of dripping.....mmmmm, dripping.
- 500g of baby onions - peeled but left whole.
- 50g plain flour seasoned with salt and pepper.
- 1 litre of stout (I used Guinness, bottles not cans, but any stout will do).
- A bouquet garni of a few parsley stalks, some thyme and a couple of bay leaves.
- 500g mushrooms - half button and half big flat ones sliced up.
- Salt and pepper.
Once you have everything sorted as per the list you need to toss your beef in the seasoned flour, shaking off any excess and set it aside. Heat a large frying pan (with a large casserole pot off the heat alongside) and fry the pancetta/bacon in the butter until the fat runs, at which point you want to remove it to the casserole but leave as much butter in the frying pan as possible. Now fry your whole baby onions in the pan until they have a bit of colour and add to the casserole. Brown the beef in batches until it's nicely coloured* and add it to the casserole. Add half a bottle or so of the stout to the frying pan and deglaze making sure you get all the tasty sticky bits, then pour into the casserole with the rest of the stout (covering the beef, add a little hot water if short), the bouquet garni and some salt and pepper. Bring to the boil and then set to a very gentle simmer for 2.5-3 hours either on the hob (a simmer mat is handy here) or in the oven at about 120C. After 90 minutes or so you need to sweat the mushrooms in some butter and then add them and the juices to the casserole.
That's it. The only thing that can go wrong is simmering too quickly or for too short a time, which causes the meat to become chewy and a little tough. Cook it slow and it'll coalesce into a meltingly tender, incredibly rich stew that smells as good as it tastes.
* Should you brown the beef? I think that's a whole separate blog post right there. By doing so you dry it slightly but you add nice flavoursome brown bits. As the beef in this recipe is cooked covered in beer I say you should risk the browning for the extra flavour.
The Wine
Brezza Barbera d'Alba Cannubi 2004 - $45 from Dan Murphys
Surprisingly light in colour, not far off Burgundian, with a beautiful but fairly delicate nose of redcurrant and rhubarb with a bit of a smoky leather with a vegetal thing lurking at the back. Might need a bit more time for the nose to develop. It's soft on the palate at first and the slightly smoky woodiness comes through with the redcurrant. Then you get a belt of tannins at the end that will soften with a bit more time. Great with food but a bit young.
