Feeds:
Posts
Comments

Posts Tagged ‘red wine’

Duck Breasts with Plum Sauce and Stir-fry Veg

Posted in Duck, Food, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on 10 October 2021| Leave a Comment »

Plums are in season and we’ve been trying to find ways to cook them. This plum sauce is really rich with warm spices and it would be good with many things. We stashed the leftovers in the freezer for another night. Save the leftover duck fat in the fridge for roast potatoes, you won’t regret it.

Wine Suggestion: Whenever we’re in the southern part of France we can’t escape duck. Tonight’s wine match followed suit with a Grenache, Syrah, Carignan blend, the Roc des Anges Sega de Cor. Smooth and silky plums, sloes and raspberry flavours grounded in a seductive stony character.

Duck breasts with plum sauce and stir-fry veg – serves 4

  • 4 duck breasts, with skin on
  • 25ml sunflower oil
  • 4 carrots, finely sliced on an angle
  • 400g of cavolo nero or half a green cabbage, remove the core and shred the leaves
  • a bunch of scallions, sliced on an angle
  • 2 cloves of garlic, grated
  • 1 tsp finely grated ginger
  • 2-4 tbsp soy sauce

FOR THE PLUM SAUCE:

  • 400g plums, remove the stones and quarter
  • 2 shallots, sliced
  • 50g brown sugar
  • 1 tsp grated ginger
  • ¼ tsp Chinese five spice
  • 25ml red wine vinegar
  • 200ml red wine
  • 2 tbsp soy sauce

Make the plum sauce first. Put all of the ingredients into a small saucepan and place over a medium heat. Bring to the boil, then reduce the heat to low and simmer for 20 minutes or until the plums are very soft. Whizz using a stick blender or food processor until smooth. Taste and season with more soy sauce if needed.

Use a sharp knife to score the duck skin and fat in a diamond pattern, but don’t cut the meat. Season and place in a frying pan, skin-side down. Put the pan over a medium heat and cook for about 10 minutes or until the skin is golden and the fat rendered. Leave to rest for 5 minutes, then cut into slices. Pour off the duck fat and keep for potatoes another day.

While the duck rests, stir-fry the veg. Put a wok over a high heat until smoking, then pour in the oil and add the carrots. Stir fry for 2 minutes, then add the cabbage, scallions, garlic, ginger and 2 tbsp of soy sauce. Cook for another couple of minutes or until the veg is softening but still with some crunch. Tip into a serving dish and add more soy sauce if needed. Serve with the duck and plum sauce.

(Original recipe from Rachel’s Everyday Kitchen by Rachel Allen, Harper Collins Publishers, 2013.)

Advertisement

Read Full Post »

Beef Bourguignon Pie

Posted in Beef, Food, Party Food, tagged , , , , , , , , on 10 November 2017| 2 Comments »

Beef Bourguignon Pie whole

Beef Bourguignon Pie whole

One of Jules’ classic dishes that combines Beef Bourguignon with a mash potato top. Old-fashioned in many ways but a great crowd pleaser and you can prep it all in advance. Some veg on the side is all you need for a hearty dinner.

A red Burgundy is not necessary for cooking, rather look for a juicy and easy red. Make sure it is decent though as it will still contribute to the flavours and quality of the dish. Having trialled relatively expensive Burgundy (to really find out!) in dishes like this though, we think it makes the dish unnecessarily expensive without adding anything extra over a decent, juicy, but cheaper red.

Wine Suggestion: If tempted to drink a red Burgundy with this dish, and want to impress, pick a fulsome appellation from the Cote d’Or if you can. Even if you pick a Bourgogne rouge make sure it has class and character as very easy, commercial examples are just a bit bland for the dish. This time we chose a northern Rhône, the J-M Gerin Côte Rôtie Champin de Seigneur which rivals good Burgundy for price but also matches it for aromatic thrill and velvety, earthy core with the same medium weight and great freshness.

Beef Bourguignon Cottage Pie – serves 6

FOR THE BOURGUIGNON BASE:

  • 1 tbsp sunflower oil/veg oil
  • 200g pack bacon lardons
  • 900g braising steak, cut into 3cm chunks
  • 225g button mushrooms
  • 225g button onions or small shallots, peeled
  • 2 garlic cloves, crushed
  • 1 tbsp demerara sugar
  • 600ml red wine
  • 400g tin beef consommé or 400ml of beef stock
  • 1 to 2 tbsp cornflour, loosened with 1-2 tbsp red wine or water

FOR THE MASH TOPPING:

  • 1.5 kg floury potatoes e.g. Maris Piper
  • 50g unsalted butter
  • 100ml milk

Heat the oil in a large pan and fry the bacon lardons over a high heat until well browned. Remove from the pan with a slotted spoon and drain on kitchen paper. Season the beef, then fry in the bacon fat until coloured. Add all the remaining ingredients, except the cornflour and bacon, and bring to a simmer. Partly cover the pan with a lid and cook for 2-2½ hours or until the beef is tender.

When the beef is cooked, tip the contents of the pan into a colander set over another pan to catch the sauce. Tip the contents of the colander into a large pie or casserole dish along with the reserved bacon. Boil the sauce and season to taste. Thicken with the loosened cornflour until you have a sauce that coats the back of a spoon. Spoon enough of the sauce over the beef to barely cover and loosen it (don’t be tempted to add too much), then stir. You can freeze or refrigerate the sauce and offer it on the side when you serve the pie.

Boil the potatoes until tender, about 15-20 minutes. Drain and replace the lid, then give the pan a good shake to break them up a bit. Add the butter and milk gradually as you mash, then season well.

Spoon the potatoes over the meat and use a knife or spoon to mark a pattern over the top. You can cool the pie at this stage and freeze if you like before baking as below.

Heat the oven to 180C/fan 160C/gas 4.

Bake the pie for 50 minutes to 1 hour or until golden. Increase the heat to 200C/fan 180C/gas 6 for the final 10 minutes to get it nicely browned on top.

(Original recipe by Gary Rhodes for BBC Good Food Magazine, November 2005.)

Beef Bourguignon Pie

Beef Bourguignon Pie

Read Full Post »

Bœuf à la Gardiane: Beef, red wine and black olive stew

Posted in Beef, Food, tagged , , , , , , , , , , on 23 February 2015| Leave a Comment »

Bœuf à la Gardiane

 

Another classic from Elizabeth David, this stew originates in the Gard region of France and is very simple but full of flavour. Elizabeth suggests serving it with rice (a la Camargue) but it also worked well with roast potatoes and rosemary. There won’t be a lot of sauce as it is almost all absorbed by the meat as it cooks but this part of the charm; intensely flavoured, tender beef.

Wine suggestion: This dish would go well with any of the local red wines of the Gard and surrounding southern-French regions (Rhone, Languedoc, etc). Any combination of Grenache, Carignan, Cinsault, Mourvedre and Syrah will work, particularly if they come from older, lower yielding vines and a sensitive hand in the winery. We drank a VdP La Clape from Domaine de Boède, Le Pavillon which is a great value combination of Cinsault and Syrah and which stood up to the flavours and adding it’s own character.

Bœuf à la gardiane – serves 4-5

  • 1kg top rump of beef, cut into small neat cubes approximately 2.5cm square
  • butter and olive oil
  • 4 tbsp brandy
  • 1 large glass of full-bodied red wine
  • bouquet garni of thyme, parsley, a little strip of orange peel and a whole garlic clove crushed with the back of a knife but left whole (tie together with thread)
  • 175g stoned black olives

Heat the butter and oil in a heavy based casserole dish and brown the beef in batches.

Warm the brandy in a soup ladle, pour over the meat, then carefully set alight. Shake the pan carefully until the flames go out.

Add the red wine and bubble for 30 seconds before seasoning with a little salt and pepper. Add the bouquet garni, turn the heat down as low as possible and cover the pan with at least two layers of greaseproof paper or foil and the lid.

Cook as gently as possible for about 3½ hours. Ten minutes before the end, remove the bouquet garni and add the olives.

Season to taste and serve.

(Original recipe from At Elizabeth David’s Table: Her very best everyday recipes, compiled by Jill Norman, Penguin, 2010.)

Read Full Post »

Chianti Beef with Rigatoni

Posted in Beef, Food, Italian, Pasta, tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , on 24 January 2015| Leave a Comment »

Chianti Beef

 

The technique used to cook the meat is quite clever as the amount of beef is small and is only quickly, flash fried which keeps the juiciness, adds the caramelisation flavours and gives great depth to the whole dish. It’s an expensive cut but the quantity required is so small that it won’t break the bank. It’s hard to believe a dish with so much flavour takes such a short time to prepare.

Wine Suggestion: we drank one of our favourite Tuscan wines: the Selvapiana Chianti Rufina which is refined and elegant and complements the beef fillet and provides a foil to the rustic black pepper background in this dish.

Rigatoni, tomato, beef and red wine – serves 4

  • 320g rigatoni
  • 200g beef fillet
  • 4 garlic cloves, sliced
  • 50g Parmesan, grated
  • 100g unsalted butter
  • 600g top quality tinned tomatoes
  • 350ml Chianti wine
  • 1tbsp ground black pepper
  • 3tbsp extra virgin olive oil

Trim the beef fillet and cut across into 5mm slices. Cut the slices into 1cm strips.

Heat the butter in a thick-bottomed pan, add the garlic and fry gently until brown. Add the tomatoes and season. Cook over a high heat for 5 minutes, stirring to break up the tomatoes, then add half the red wine. Continue to cook on quite a high heat, adding more wine as the sauce reduces. Cook for 15 minutes in total, using up all the wine, then stir in the pepper.

Heat the olive oil in a frying pan until very hot. Add the beef pieces and fry very briefly, just to brown each piece on both sides. Stir the beef into the sauce with any juices from the pan.

Cook the rigatoni in boiling salted until al dente. Drain and add to the sauce.

Serve with the Parmesan.

(Original recipe from Italian Two Easy: Simple Recipes from the London River Cafe by Rose Gray and Ruth Rogers, Random House, 2006.)

Read Full Post »

Red Wine & Mushroom Risotto

Posted in Food, Italian, tagged , , , , , , on 6 October 2011| Leave a Comment »

Woohoo it’s mushroom season at last. Cold weather has its virtues. We always think of risotto as a bit of weekend thing but it’s so quick and easy we’ve vowed to make every night a potential risotto night in future. The perfect mid-week treat.

Red wine  & mushroom risotto – to serve 4

  • olive oil
  • 50g butter
  • 1 red onion, chopped
  • 400g chestnut mushrooms (we used large field mushrooms)
  • 300g risotto rice
  • 350ml dry red wine
  • 750ml chicken stock
  • 3 tbsp grated Parmesan

Heat 2 tbsp olive oil and half the butter in a large, heavy pan. Fry the onions until nearly soft. Add the mushrooms and cook until golden. Add the rice, stir to coat with the oil and butter, and cook for a minute.

Add half the wine and let it bubble, stirring. Add the rest of the wine to the stock and heat gently. When the first lot of wine has been absorbed start adding the remaining stock and wine mix, a ladle at a time, stirring all the time. Make sure each ladle has been absorbed before you add the next. Continue adding liquid until  the rice is tender but still has a bite. Add the remaining butter and the parmesan, cover and let it sit for 5 minutes before serving.

Wine Suggestion: We found this recipe in BBC Olive Magazine (October 2011) in an article by Victoria Moore, drinks expert, who highly recommends a Barbera to go with this on account of it’s high acidity and hence palate-cleansing effects. It also complements the earthy mushroom flavours. We’d agree with that!

Read Full Post »

An easy Corbières for a cold & wet summer evening in Dublin

Posted in France, Wine, tagged , , , , , , on 24 June 2011| Leave a Comment »

Reserve du Reverend, Corbières 2009, €9.95 from Mitchell & Son, Dublin

Jules and I regularly drink wines from the south of France, we find them reliable and usually good value; the Reserve du Reverend is no exception.

Corbières is the largest appellation in the Languedoc, southern France. As such it has the advantage of good, warm weather and plenty of sunshine. It also has cooling breezes sweeping up from the Mediterranean into the Pyrenees. This breeze helps keep the grapes from getting too hot and then becoming jammy and alcoholic.

Like many wines from this area the Reserve du Reverend is a blend of Carignan, Grenache and Syrah; these grapes give a juiciness without any hard edges. The joy here is the balance of brambly, dark berried fruit and the easy, velvety and slightly herbal spices. A wine that doesn’t try to be any more than enjoyable and drinkable. Because it succeeds at this there is a big cheers from me.

A wine that is as easy to drink on its own, or with rustic French fare: grilled meats, roast duck, lamb or ratatouille.

After a long week at work and on a rainy Friday night in the middle of our Irish summer it was good to get home, cook a simple pasta and open something uncomplicated but well made, balanced and enjoyable.

Read Full Post »

Georgio Locatelli’s duck breast with broccoli

Posted in Duck, Food, Rhône, Syrah, Wine, tagged , , , , , , , , , on 29 November 2010| Leave a Comment »

I’ve had Georgio Locatelli’s Made in Italy for yonks now but had yet to try any of the recipes until tonight. We had some duck breasts and were looking for a tasty recipe without too many ingredients. This fitted the bill perfectly except one of the ingredients proved very difficult to find – if you live in Dublin you can get farro or spelt in Fallon & Byrne but we had to go twice to find it!

After all this faffing about looking for farro you can’t even see it in our picture. I promise that is there though (under the duck breast).

This was absolutely fabulous and quite straight forward though I recommend you get organised with all the pans and stuff before you start.

Duck breast with brocoli (for 4 people)

4 duck breasts

4 tablespoons farro (spelt)

145ml extra-virgin olive oil

2 heads of broccoli, separated into florets

2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce

2 garlic cloves, sliced

1 red chilli, deseeded and sliced

salt and pepper

  • Take the duck breasts out of the fridge about an hour before you start.
  • Soak the farro in cold water for 20 minutes, then drain.
  • Preheat oven to 220C (gas 7).
  • Bring a pan of unsalted water to the boil and cook the farro for 15 minutes (salted water will make it go hard). Drain and tip onto a tray or big plate. Sprinkle 2 tablespoons of the olive oil over and toss to coat the grains and keep them separate. Give them a jiggle every few minutes so they don’t stick together.
  • Blanch the broccoli in boiling salted water for a minute or two to just soften it. Drain and set aside.
  • Score the skin and season the duck; this helps the fat to render. Heat an oven-proof saute pan to medium-hot, then put in the duck, skin-side down, and cook until it turns golden (about 6 minutes). Turn over and cook for 1 minute, then turn down the heat. Take the duck out and keep warm.
  • Drain the fat off the pan, add the Worcestershire sauce and 3 tablespoons of the remaining oil. Stir to emulsify and turn off the heat.
  • Heat a saute pan, add the remaining oil, followed by the garlic and chilli, and cook without colouring for a few minutes.Add the broccoli and saute without allowing to colour, until just soft. Season.
  • In a separate pan, fry the farro without any extra oil until slightly crisp (drain off excess oil as you go). Season.
  • Put the duck into a roasting tray and put in the oven for 2-3 minutes (or more if you like it more done).
  • Spoon the farro into the middle of the plates, and arrange the broccoli around it with the oil.
  • Slice the duck and put on top of the farro and finish with the sauce.

This was so tasty Jono wanted a second helping even though he was stuffed!

We served this with a glass of red 2005 Saint Joseph ‘Les Pierres Leches’ from Yves Cuilleron. Nice medium weight so it doesn’t overwhelm the food but a really tasty and flavoursome Syrah at the same time. Highly recommended.

Julie

Read Full Post »