Beef Bourguignon over Potato Carrot Silk
Mastering the Art of French Cooking
Beef Burgundy is the classic dish made famous by Julia Child in her cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking. This wonderful, aromatic beef, smothered by earthy mushrooms and onions in a rich winey broth, which literally melts in your mouth, has raised the simple beef stew to a form of art. September just so happens to be national mushroom month- I swear I don’t make these things up, and my husband’s birthday whose absolute favorite meal is Bœuf Bourguignon, so what’s a busy girl to do?
If you’ve never made beef burgundy you might shy away from the long list of ingredients and even longer cooking time, but really it’s not all that difficult and you can even make it days in advance and freeze it. You know I’ve done it! But even so, I decided to challenge myself to come up with an even faster, but equally amazingly delicious way to make this wonderful dish and here it is!
The Steak and Skate at Bistro Niko
Authentic French Cooking
Surprisingly enough, we rarely ever order the Beef Bourguignon at our absolute favorite Atlanta French restaurant, Bistro Niko. We love going there for special occasions. Their attentive staff always take care of our young girls, bringing them fruit cups and ice cream. And the Skate Wing Beurre Noir and Steak au Poivre are absolutely to-die-for! We always order both and share. We call it our Steak and Skate and it truly is one of our all-time favorite meals. But I digress. My husband stopped ordering his favorite Beef Bourguignon every time, not because it isn’t absolutely amazing, but he just likes mine more! No kidding. Plus I can’t readily get my hands on good Skate Wing so that’s a much more exciting choice, never mind the fact that it’s swimming in a brown butter caper sauce that is so delicious I could lick the plate.
Short Cut Beef Bourguignon over Silky Potatoes and Carrots
Mastering the Art of Shortcuts
So what’s the secret behind my fabulous short cut Beef Bourguignon? Drumroll please…rather than take the time to cut up beef into cubes, just to have to brown them in batches and then remove them morsel by delicious morsel at the end to make the perfect sauce, I just cook the round of beef whole. Just like that. And trust me, the end result is shredded beef saturated in the rich wine sauce with not a single bite of dryness, which is sometimes my complaint when making this dish with chunks of a leaner cut of beef. My husband who is the ultimate beef burgundy critic having tasted it all over the world and at every French restaurant we’ve ever been to, took one bite and declared this the BEST beef Bourguignon ever, hands down. I have to agree and I think you will too!
Ingredients
2 to 2 1/2 lb top or bottom round roast or pot roast
3 slices Thick Center Cut Bacon, chopped
Extra Virgin Olive Oil
1 Carrot, roughly sliced
1 Onion, roughly chopped
1 Celery Stalk, roughly sliced
1 Tbs All purpose flour
2 Garlic Cloves, halved
1 large Onion, diced
3 cups Dry Red Wine
2 cups Beef Broth or Stock
8 whole Black Peppercorns
1 Bay Leaf
4 tsp dried Thyme
3 tsp dried Parsley
1 Tbs Tomato Paste
1 Tbs Unsalted Butter
8 oz Baby Bella Mushrooms, sliced
Preparation
- Pat the beef dry and generously season with salt and pepper all over.
- In a french oven or similar large cast iron pot, brown the bacon over medium high heat. Remove and set aside.
- Brown the beef on all sides in the rendered bacon fat or extra virgin olive oil to form a nice peppery crust, about 6 minutes total. Remove beef from the pot and set aside with the bacon.
- Reduce the heat to medium. In the same pot, saute the onions, carrots and celery for about 6 minutes until the vegetables are softened and start to take on some color. Add a little more olive oil if needed. Season with salt and pepper. Add the garlic and flour and cook for another 2 minutes while stirring.
- Add the wine slowly to deglaze the pot, in other words get all the yummy brown bits off the bottom. Add the broth and spices to the pot. Return the beef, bacon and any juices that might have escaped to the pot. Bring the liquid to a boil.
- Transfer the pot to an oven pre-heated to 350 degrees and bake for 3 to 3 and 1/2 hours until tender.
- Meanwhile, melt a little butter in a skillet over medium heat. Add the baby bella mushrooms and saute until softened. Season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
- Remove the pot from the oven. Take the beef out and set it aside on a plate. Bring the liquid to a boil, cover and boil for 10 minutes to reduce and thicken the sauce. Season with salt and pepper if needed. Using an immersion blender, puree the sauce until smooth. Alternatively you can put the sauce in a blender and then return to the pot once it is smooth.
- Place the beef back in the pot and add the sauteed mushrooms.
- Using two forks, shred the beef. Stir the beef around to soak in the wonderful wine sauce. Serve with mashed potatoes or Carrot Potato Silk.
Cooking Notes
The recipe isn’t as long as it looks, and I included step-by-step pictures so you can see how easy the process really is. Most of the recipe time is not hands-on preparation time. By using the whole beef roast instead of beef chunks you save so much time and you sacrifice absolutely nothing on taste.
When I first learned how to make Beef Bourguignon in cooking school, I immediately ran out and bought a Le Creuset French Oven. It was expensive and I only have the one size, but I use it for absolutely everything and I can’t imagine life without it! I didn’t get an immersion blender until we got into soups but it’s a lifesaver as well. If you love to cook I highly recommend adding these to your holiday shopping list!
I use center cut bacon so it doesn’t render a whole lot of fat, but if it totally offends you to cook the beef in bacon fat just dump it out and use olive oil instead. If you can’t have bacon in your diet then this recipe is not for you. Just kidding. Leave it out. You can add a few drops of liquid smoke but it will be fine if you don’t. There are plenty of other ingredients in this dish that make it spectacular.
If your beef roast is not completely submerged in the cooking liquid, add some more broth. Otherwise, you can turn it every hour but personally I’d rather just forget about it.
Finally, I sometimes forget to buy the celery. It’s just one of those things I don’t use often in the kitchen but I always have celery salt in the pantry and a few sprinkles works just as well. You might throw in another carrot stick just to help thicken that delicious sauce.
Suggested Wine Pairings
This rich beef stew hails from the French region of Burgundy so it seems like a Burgundy wine or Pinot Noir would be an obvious choice to serve along with it. After all earthy Pinots just love earthy mushrooms so it really is a match made in heaven. This rich dish is also excellent served with a hearty Cabernet, Bordeaux-style blend or Côtes-du-Rhône. I would definitely opt for red over white in this case but if you must drink white wine, look for a full-bodied one with moderate acidity to stand up to the rich sauce and beef. An old world Chardonnay or white Burgundy might just be up for the challenge.
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