One of the best meals I’ve ever made.

I’ve been wanting to try Julia’s recipe for a while now but was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to pull it off. I was a little intimidated because my husband Mike had Beef Bourgugnon in Paris a few months ago and I was afraid mine wouldn’t compare. But I realized  no one gets better by doing nothing so I bought my ingredients and followed this on-line recipe from Tablespoon.com. I really liked  this recipe because it was easy for me to follow.

Most of the ingredients are straight forward, but I have never cooked with chunk bacon before. I found thick bacon at Walmart and cut it into 1 1/2 inch strips before cooking it in a large pan. Bacon truly makes everything better.  For the 3 cups of wine I used Walmart’s Oak Leaf Sweet Red, about $3 and worked wonderfully for this dish.

This recipe really isn’t that complicated, the only thing that makes it a little difficult is the 4 hour cooking time in the oven. I ended up cooking mine 3 hours because we were starving and the smell was driving us insane, plus the meat was really tender after the 3 hours. I ended up serving the Beef Bourgugnon over a baked potato but you can serve it over noodles, rice, or  just out of the pot. For low carb diets you could also serve it over cauliflower or cauliflower mash.

I’m excited to try this recipe again but I’m going to make a few changes. This particular recipe didn’t call for potatoes or carrots, and I would like to incorporate them into the dish. Plus to make it a little more time friendly I’m going to make it the same way but instead of cooking in the oven, I’m going to cook it in the crock pot, that way I can leave the house and not hover around the stove for several hours.

The Walmart wine was fine for cooking the meat but I wouldn’t serve it with the meal. I opened a bottle of A3 Red Blend wine, as you can see by the photo of the empty bottle Mike & I liked it. And for about $8 it’s affordable. I really recommend this red wine with a rich meat dish like Beef Bourgugnon because the tannins and acidity in the wine really bring out the flavor in the meat and sauce.

All I can say now is that this recipe is delicious and Mike loved the dinner. I’m really excited to try my next Julia Child recipe Poulet Au Porto (blog to come).

I love trying and learning new things; whether it’s cooking a new recipe, doing a craft project (I’m making wine corks – blog will come later), painting a picture (currently working on a 4 foot painting of Amsterdam), learning new software, or marketing technology.

If you love tender meat and bright red wine try this recipe, you will be glad you did, bon appetit!

Cheers – Carrie

Recipe
Here is a list of the ingredients:

1 – 6 ounce piece chunk bacon
3  -1/2 tablespoons olive oil
3 pounds lean stew beef, cut into 2-inch cubes
1 onion, sliced
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons flour
3 cups red wine, young and full bodied
3 cups beef stock
1 tablespoon tomato paste
2 cloves mashed garlic
1/2 teaspoon thyme
1 bay leaf, crumbled
20 small white onions
3 1/2 tablespoons butter