The Monocle magazine this month is featuring all things military. One of the articles talks about food they serve at army camps and a recipe called “Pot-au-feu” (army beef stew) was featured. It is a simple recipe; basically boiling some root vegetables and cabbage in a pot of beef broth and beef chunks. Not sure why but it made me and The Man salivate for a bowl of hearty stew the entire night.
The next day, I searched the internet for a more robust beef stew recipe. Oh boy, there are a kazillion such recipes out there and each one saying theirs is the best. If you don’t believe me, try googling “best beef stew”. There are over 5 million hits! So I downloaded 5 different recipes and I analyzed them for similarities and disparities to filter out the ‘best practices’ in each. Then I spoke to a couple of friends online to check whether they have any prior experience in beef stew. I got some useful insights. The Queen once gave me a recipe for boeuf bourguignon– I never got to try it because it requires me to only use a fresh leg of a cow from the wet market. (Note: I have never gone to a wet market in Singapore.) Anyway, after a thorough analysis, I put together a recipe that is simple enough even for me to pull off.
After work, I went to Cold Storage to get the ingredients. You should see me at the herbs section. I cannot tell thyme from grass. And everything looks like grass. At the meat section, I struggled with what sort of beef to get. There are shanks, chucks, sirloins, bla bla bla. In the end, I chose chuck because I vaguely remember one of the 5 recipes mention this cut can be used. Most importantly, it is on discount as it was expiring soon (do they expire?) - what a bargain! I have absolutely no problem getting the red wine though. According to my research, the best kind to use for beef stews is merlot. I don’t particularly like merlot (for drinking) so I chose a blend of cabernet + merlot from Australia. I still need to polish off the rest of the bottle, right?
Back home, the first thing I did was to pour myself a glass of wine (hehe) then I prepare to cut the ingredients up. Can I just put it out there that I am bad at peeling root vegetables? I always end up wasting a lot of it because I slice off too much of the flesh. Cold Storage sells peeled potatoes and onions so I was mighty happy. They are expensive though, and some might say a total waste of money, but it will still be a waste if I do the peeling so it works out to be the same. They don’t sell peeled carrots though. When I was done with the carrot, it was half its original size. I will never make it on Master Chef.
Once all the ingredients are ready (I put them in separate bowls like how they do it in cooking shows – for fun!), I called The Man to do the actual cooking. You see, he loves it (because it de-stresses him) and I love it (because then I can blame him if the food suck). Sometimes I do silly narration as he cooks (like in cooking shows) and interview him on his methods and techniques to which he will give me the most irritating responses. We do this in Chinese because we watch a lot of “Fang Tai” on Channel 8 when we were younger. Do you remember her? Anyway, give couple cooking a shot if you can. It’s a great way to boost your relationship provided at least one party is not a control freak.
Halfway through the session, I was already drunk from the wine. Thank goodness I didn’t have to wait too long to eat as the cooking time is quick – around an hour only. Most recipes require the beef stew to be stewed for hours but if you chop the ingredients small enough and use only tender cuts of meat, you can half the cooking time. So within an hour, we had steaming bowls of stew in front of us. I bought a really tasty loaf of multi grain bread from Cedele which I sliced up with some butter to go with.
Verdict: The stew was simply out of the world! It was warm and hearty and the rich aromatic flavor just dance around your tongue for ages. I want to say “it’s just like how my mama makes it” but I don’t have an Italian mum and my Chinese mother doesn’t cook beef so I never had this at home. If I have a child, I will make this his/her staple diet. Definitely comfort food for the soul.
This is my first ever post about cooking so you can tell I am in delirium. I wouldn’t be blogging about it if it wasn’t that good, right? I brought some leftover to work and I just licked the bowl clean.
So I decided to share this recipe with everyone so you can try it out too. I will reiterate that this recipe is not original because it is simply an amalgamation of all other similar recipes I found. I can’t claim ownership rights so instead of “THE FROU’S BEEF STEW”, I will simply call it, “THE AMAZEBALLZ BEEF STEW”.
Let me know what you think if you do try it. Enjoy!
The Amazeball Beef Stew – portion is good for 4 serves.
½ kg beef cubes or tender beef chuck (cut into 1 inch cubes).
2 potatoes, peeled and cubed
2 carrots, peeled and cubed
2 cloves of garlic
1 white onion diced
1 can of diced tomatoes
3-4 bay leaves
1 tablespoon of fresh thyme, chopped
1 glass of red wine (preferably merlot)
1 tablespoon of flour
3 cups of beef stock
1 tablespoon of sugar
4-5 shakes of Worchester sauce
Cracked sea salt and black pepper
Extra virgin olive oil
In a large pot, heat some olive oil and sear the beef on high heat until slightly brown. Remove and set aside.
In the same pot using the leftover oil, cook the onion, garlic, potatoes and carrot.
Stir in the tomatoes.
Add in the flour and stir well. Make sure there are no lumps.
Return the beef to pot. Pour in the red wine and let it boil for several minutes until the alcohol evaporates.
Add in the beef stock and bay leaves.
Cover and let it cook for half an hour.
After half an hour, add Worchester sauce, pepper, salt and sugar.
Let it cook for another 15 minutes before adding the thyme. If there is too much liquid, add in some flour mixture (flour + hot water) to thicken it.
Serve hot with crusty bread.
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