Friday, March 18, 2016

My Paris Kitchen: Belgian Beef Stew with Beer and Spice Bread

On the one hand, I was looking forward to a nice long day of slow cooking. On the other hand, I'm admittedly not a huge fan of stews. Especially stews that require you to make a separate recipe, for pain d'epices, a day or two ahead of time. However, some of Dorie's recipes in Around My French Table have opened me up to enjoying stew--sometimes--and the honey spice bread sounded delicious on its own. The idea of slathering slices of it with mustard and stirring it into the stew? Odd.

I'm not sure that my bread turned out the way it was supposed to. The photo in the book is domed and looks like it has an airy crumb. Mine came out of the oven already sunk in the center, and it was dense and kind of chewy. It tasted good, but I kept re-reading the recipe to see if I had missed a step or an ingredient. Nothing jumped out at me.
I started the stew right after I ate lunch. It smelled amazing while it was cooking. I wish I'd followed my gut and crisped up the bacon a bit before adding the onions. I know perfectly well that any time a recipe tells me to add bacon and onions together, the bacon stays flaccid and fatty. Yuck.

Maybe I didn't cut my chuck roast into small enough pieces. After five hours, it was still not fork-tender.

I cut the difference on adding the spice bread to the stew, and only used two slices. I'm glad I didn't use the full four slices, because I think it would have made the broth too sludgy.

I ate a little. I didn't really love it. If the meat had broken down more, I'd have been happier. The flavor was okay. The meat was way too tough for me. I didn't have more than five hours to let it simmer.

Conclusion: Liked the spice bread, especially slathered with plum jam. Didn't really like the stew.

17 comments:

  1. Hello! a few other posts also had breads with a slightly sunken top. this recipe has A LOT of leaveners (baking soda and baking powder) and sugar in it. if you decide to make it again, try reducing the baking soda by half. I live at an altitude over 5000' and reduced it to 1/4 tsp (but made a lot of other changes too). Not sure why your meat didn't get tender though. Sorry for a rough day in the kitchen!

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  2. I think we could have swapped posts this week. I'm also not a stew lover, even when I've had it made correctly in a restaurant, but it still annoys me that I can't seem to get it right when I cook it at home. It's probably a pride thing. I poked around online and the consensus seems to be that I either over or undercooked the meat. Helpful.

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  3. So sorry this wasn't exactly a winner for you. As for stew meat, I always cut it into small pieces cause I can't stand hunks of meat and they take way too long to cook
    and never really get tender.

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  4. I am only so so on stews, but definitely enjoyed the bread! The addition of plum jam sounds fantastic.

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  5. I am only so so on stews, but definitely enjoyed the bread! The addition of plum jam sounds fantastic.

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  6. Interesting - I saw a few other posts where people's meat was not tender enough but mine was more than tender after 2 hours! In fact I considered removing it a bit earlier from the heat because I was worried about the "mush" factor!

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  7. That's so frustrating when a baked good turns out that way. Sorry the stew wasn't a hit, either. I've got some plum jelly in the fridge - I'll have to try it with the bread tomorrow!

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  8. I had the same thoughts too on browning the bacon without the onions, but followed DL's method in the end. I had problems with my bread... since I played around with the quantities for the honey and sugar resulting in a stiffer batter. It was not pretty in the looks department too.

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  9. I had the same thoughts too on browning the bacon without the onions, but followed DL's method in the end. I had problems with my bread... since I played around with the quantities for the honey and sugar resulting in a stiffer batter. It was not pretty in the looks department too.

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  10. How interesting that your meat was still not tender after so long! Sorry to hear that! The bread certainly was good though!

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  11. One thought about the beef not getting tender in five hours. Did you use a dutch oven? Following this recipe, this stew is much better than other ways I've prepared it. It worked for me!

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  12. Sorry this didn't work the way you wanted it to, that's a bummer. I am convinced that there are days when evil kitchen elves and destroy all our best efforts. It's the only logical reason I have come up with to explain some of the things that randomly happen here. Feel free to chalk it up to that...

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  13. I'm with you on this one. The spice bread was good but I just didn't like it in the stew, and I like stews!

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  14. Yeah, I'm not a huge stew fan either. I'm glad you liked the bread, though, with plum jam!

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  15. Oh, man. Between this and the cauliflower, March was not a good month for you and this book. I'm not a huge beef stew fan either, frankly. It's okay is about the best I usually get. I hope that the next many months have good recipes to make up for this one. ;)

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