You brown cubes of chuck until they are frankly dark, then settle them in red Burgundy with stock and time. What you want is beef that has given up, sitting in a sauce the colour of old mahogany, with lardons, mushrooms and pearl onions. A Sunday dish, and better on Monday.
The same grammar as coq au vin, applied to chuck: wine in the pot until the collagen yields. Farmhouse cooking of the Côte d'Or that Escoffier wrote down and did not improve.
Brown the meat thoroughly — that is the flavour. Braise at 300°F until a fork meets no argument. It will not be hurried. Serve with boiled potatoes or buttered noodles, something plain to catch the sauce.
Method
- 01
Heat the oven to 300°F and season the beef generously; this is a large piece of meat, and it needs it. Render the lardons in a casserole until they have given up their fat, then brown the beef thoroughly in that fat, in batches. Take your time — a pale cube will never give you a mahogany sauce. The browned bits on the bottom of the pot are the flavor; don't wash them away.
- 02
Stir in the flour and the tomato paste and cook a minute, until the paste darkens and smells sweet. Add the crushed garlic, the wine, the stock, the carrots and the bouquet garni. Bring it to a simmer, cover, and braise in the oven until the beef yields to a fork with no argument, about 2½ hours. It will not be hurried.
- 03
Brown the pearl onions and the mushrooms in butter until they are glazed and golden. Fold them into the stew for the last 30 minutes of cooking, so they take on the sauce but keep their shape. They are not garnish; they are the rest of the dish. If they go in at the start they will dissolve, and you will have lost them.
- 04
Skim the fat from the surface — there will be some, and the sauce is better without the slick. Reduce it if needed until it coats a spoon, then discard the bouquet garni. Serve with boiled potatoes or buttered noodles, something plain to catch the sauce. The broth should taste of wine reduced to its bones.
