Mastering the Art of French Food Blogging Clichés: Julia Child’s Bouef Bourguignon (Beef Stew in Red Wine with Bacon, Onions, and Mushrooms)

I knew this day had to come eventually…the day when I utterly and totally stooped to the world of food blogging clichés, and….I LIKED IT.

You see, here’s the thing.  I am in love with Julia Child.  Like any good food blogger (with a peculiar interest in French food), there’s this secret unwritten code that some of our favorite dishes will always come from Mastering the Art of French Cooking.  If, in the world of food blogs, there was a matriarch, her name would be Julia Child.

Of course this Child-olatry (i.e., the obsession with all things Julia Child) takes its cue from the movie Julie and Julia, and in many ways, making any dish from her book is a bit of a cliché.  I think many women (and men) began food blogs after seeing this movie in part because the story was so exciting (you can launch a writing career from your home desk and eat good food!) and in part because everyone loves Julia Child.  Happily, I admit, I am not one of these bloggers, but I do love a good Julia Child movie!

Last night, I was so excited about my initiation into this élite French food blogging club, that I went a little crazy at the grocery store.  I bought two bottles of French beer…

A wheel of real French Brie, AND fancy miniature desserts that were devoured before I could photograph them.

My dinner companion loved the classic French stew and I must say, this recipe is famous for a reason.  It’s one of the best stews I’ve ever had.

According to Child, “in the case with most famous dishes, there are more ways than one to arrive at a good beouf bourguignon.”  And Julia is totally right.  Although her recipe was clean, simple, and fully bodied, I have to admit that many French chefs prepare this dish with quite a bit more booze.  Julia’s recipe only calls for three cups of red wine, but I’ve seen my friend Jessica (a French girl with a chef for a father) make a batch that involved two bottles of red wine!

To think Julia only wanted three cups…perhaps she drank the rest of the bottle? Smart lady.

If you’re interested in boozier variations of this classic French dish, check-out the ones listed below.  Ina Garden also suggests a really boozy variation involving not only an entire bottle of red wine, but also a half cup of cognac to boot.  See her recipe here.

Perhaps it’s all this wine (or in my case, the beer), but I’m really liking being a French food blogging cliché.  If only for a night.

Boeuf Bourguignon: Boeuf À La Bourguignonne

[Beef Stew in Red Wine with Bacon, Onions, and Mushrooms]

This version of Boeuf Bourguignon is quite literally made by the book.  Cooked straight off page 315 of Volume 1 of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, I made sure to make this recipe (for the first time) exactly as Julia had suggested.  Part of this recipe’s American appeal undoubtedly comes from the simple nature of the ingredients list while packing a serious punch.  For other variations of this recipe, see Elise Bauer’s recipe here and Deb’s vegetarian Mushroom Bourguignon at Smitten Kitchen here, or my version of Deb’s dish here.

Ingredients:

* 6-ounces bacon

* 9-10-inch casserole dish (fireproof–such as a dutch oven)

* 1 tablespoon olive oil

* 3 lbs lean stewing beef cut into 2-inch cubes

* 1 sliced carrot

* 1 sliced onion

* 1 teaspoon salt

* 1/4 teaspoon pepper

* 2 tablespoons flour

* 3 cups of full-bodied, young red wine such as one of those suggested for serving (Beaujolais, Côtes du Rhône, Bordeaux-St. Émilion, or Burgundy), or a Chianti

*2 to 3 cups beef stock

* 1 tablespoon tomato paste

* 2 cloves mashed garlic

* 1/2 teaspoon thyme

* bay leaf, crumbled

* 18 to 24 small white onions (such as shallots)

* 1 lb. fresh mushrooms sautéed in butter

1.) Preheat oven to 450F.  Cut bacon into 1-inch chunks and sauté for 2-3 minutes in your dutch oven (or until the bacon starts to render its fat).  Remove from pot and leave bacon fat grease.

2.) While bacon is cooking, pat dry your meat (it won’t brown if you don’t pat it dry).  Although Julia doesn’t suggest you season the meat with anything, I went ahead and added a combination of salt, pepper, and thyme to both sides of the meat.  Add beef to bacon grease and brown lightly on each side making sure not to crowd the pot.  This step may take several batches–1 batch per pound of beef (3 batches).

3.) While beef is browning, slice 1 onion and 1 carrot thinly.  Only having baby carrots on hand, I simply added 1/2 a bag of baby carrots to the pot with the sliced onions in the next step as a substitution.

4.) Remove the last of the browned meat from your pan and brown the vegetables–onion and carrot(s)–in the sautéing fat.

5.) Return beef and bacon to the casserole dish and toss with salt and pepper.  Sprinkle on the flour and toss again so that all of the ingredients are coated lightly.  Place dutch oven in preheated 450F oven for 4 minutes, remove, stir, and place back in oven for another 4 minutes.  According to Julia, this step ensures that your flour browns while covering the meat in a lovely thin crust.  Remove dutch oven and lower heat to 325F.

6.) Now, the fun part: stir in your wine and enough beef stock to barely cover the meat.  Add tomato paste, garlic, thyme (and any other herbs you may be using–I added 1 tablespoon of Rosemary here).  Bring mixture to a simmer on top of stove.  Cover dutch oven, set on the lower third of your oven and allow to simmer in 325F oven for 2 1/2 to 3 hours.

NOTE: for those of you fans of Julie and Julia, this is the step where Julie Powell falls asleep and wakes up to a smoking house of ruined beouf bourguignon.  So, make sure to monitor your heat so that the liquid simmers very slowly during this time period.  I suggest stirring / checking every 30 minutes.

7.) While cooking the beef stew, prepare your french onions and mushrooms.  Julia suggests quartering the mushrooms, but I just love the way small, whole cooked mushrooms look, so I washed and kept them in tact.  As for the shallots, this step is a bit frustrating (my thumbs still hurt from peeling them).  To make the peeling of your shallots easier, warm them up for 8 seconds in a standard microwave open.  When you go to remove the last layer of thin skin, it’ll come right off due to the short release of the shallot’s juices.  Trust me, you’ll be grateful you tried this trick!

8.) At about 2 hours, remove dutch oven and evenly distribute in the shallots and mushrooms.  Return to stove and allow to cook for an additional hour.

Remove final dish from oven and enjoy! Makes 8-10 servings.  Serve with my Smashed Potatoes recipe.  For regular Mashed Potatoes, simply remove the skin instead of leaving it on.

–Helana Brigman

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