Boeuf Bourguignon

I made my first Julia Child recipe this weekend. Actually, I should say I made my first, second, and third Julia Child recipes this weekend. I decided to make boeuf bourguignon, and within that recipe were recipes for the onions and mushrooms that go into the stew. As Julia suggests in the introduction, I read through the entire recipe first (although I always do this anyways). I was particularly nervous because I had it in my head that any of her recipes would be very complicated and time-consuming. I wanted to make sure I understood every step.

The recipe is supposed to serve four to six people, so I halved it to make dinner for two. Even that much left us with plenty for the next night.

Here's a version that was published in The New York Times. It combines the separate recipes for making the onions and the mushrooms in the whole recipe.

Ingredients
One 6-ounce piece of chunk bacon
3 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
3 pounds lean stewing beef, cut into 2-inch cubes
1 sliced carrot
1 sliced onion
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons flour
3 cups full-bodied, young red wine (like Beaujolais, Cotes du Rhone or Burgundy)
2 1/2 to 3 1/2 cups brown beef stock
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 cloves mashed garlic
1/2 teaspoon thyme
A crumbled bay leaf
18 to 24 small white onions
3 1/2 tablespoons butter
Herb bouquet (4 parsley sprigs, one-half bay leaf, one-quarter teaspoon thyme, tied in cheesecloth)
1 pound quartered fresh mushrooms.

Instructions
1. Remove bacon rind and cut into lardons (sticks 1/4-inch thick and 1 1/2 inches long). Simmer rind and lardons for 10 minutes in 1 1/2 quarts water. Drain and dry.

2. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

3. Sauté lardons in 1 tablespoon of the olive oil in a flameproof casserole over moderate heat for 2 to 3 minutes to brown lightly. Remove to a side dish with a slotted spoon.


4. Dry beef in paper towels; it will not brown if it is damp. Heat fat in casserole until almost smoking. Add beef, a few pieces at a time, and sauté until nicely browned on all sides. Add it to the lardons.




5. In the same fat, brown the sliced vegetables. Pour out the excess fat. Return the beef and bacon to the casserole and toss with 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Then sprinkle on the flour and toss again to coat the beef lightly. Set casserole uncovered in middle position of preheated oven for 4 minutes. Toss the meat again and return to oven for 4 minutes (this browns the flour and coves the meat with a light crust). Remove casserole and turn oven down to 325 degrees.




6. Stir in wine and 2 to 3 cups stock, just enough so that the meat is barely covered. Add the tomato paste, garlic, herbs and bacon rind. Bring to a simmer on top of the stove. Cover casserole and set in lower third of oven. Regulate heat so that liquid simmers very slowly for 3 to 4 hours. The meat is done when a fork pierces it easily.


7. While the beef is cooking, prepare the onions and mushrooms. Heat 1 1/2 tablespoons butter with one and one-half tablespoons of the oil until bubbling in a skillet. Add onions and sauté over moderate heat for about 10 minutes, rolling them so they will brown as evenly as possible. Be careful not to break their skins. You cannot expect them to brown uniformly. Add 1/2 cup of the stock, salt and pepper to taste and the herb bouquet. Cover and simmer slowly for 40 to 50 minutes until the onions are perfectly tender but hold their shape, and the liquid has evaporated. Remove herb bouquet and set onions aside.



8. Wipe out skillet and heat remaining oil and butter over high heat. As soon as you see butter has begun to subside, indicating it is hot enough, add mushrooms. Toss and shake pan for 4 to 5 minutes. As soon as they have begun to brown lightly, remove from heat.


9. When the meat is tender, pour the contents of the casserole into a sieve set over a saucepan. Wash out the casserole and return the beef and lardons to it. Distribute the cooked onions and mushrooms on top. Skim fat off sauce in saucepan. Simmer sauce for a minute or 2, skimming off additional fat as it rises. You should have about 2 1/2 cups of sauce thick enough to coat a spoon lightly. If too thin, boil it down rapidly. If too thick, mix in a few tablespoons stock. Taste carefully for seasoning. Pour sauce over meat and vegetables. Cover and simmer 2 to 3 minutes, basting the meat and vegetables with the sauce several times. Serve in casserole, or arrange stew on a platter surrounded with potatoes, noodles or rice, and decorated with parsley.

Yield: 6 servings.




After pouring the whole mixture through a sieve, I was supposed to be able to skim any fat off the top of the liquid. I had a hard time with this and didn't end up skimming much of anything off. Perhaps I had somehow already made a fat-free version? (Bacon makes that unlikely.) When I talked to my dad about this afterward, he said to just stick the bowl in the fridge for a few minutes, the fat would harden, and the task would be as simple as scooping that layer off.

Julia says this can be prepared a day ahead and then reheated, so that's what I did. It's sort of nice to sit down to dinner after merely simmering something on the stove for 15 minutes as opposed to putting in a good 2 to 3 hours of work. The memory of the effort I had put in the day before, along with the ease of rewarming it that night, made this quite an enjoyable meal. I was glad I had taken the time to tackle one of Julia's recipes. I learned it wasn't all that difficult, just time-consuming. And in the end we had a fragrant, warming stew with tender chunks of beef and soft, pillowy onions. Just a little fresh bread and some mashed potatoes rounded out the meal and some molten chocolate cake for dessert topped us off.



Note: I couldn't find a chunk of bacon, so I just used strips instead. I also chose to use cipollini onions instead of little white onions.