Boeuf Bourguignon or I Have the Paris Blues Again

My Paris-fever came back with a vengeance recently, thanks to my boyfriend getting me hooked on "Spiral", an awesome French cop show. Watching people chase criminals around the world's most beautiful city, stopping to eat a croissant every once in a while, had me longingly flipping through my bistro cookbooks while listening to Jacques Brel (cliché, I know, but so awesome).

While there is a plan to take a trip to the City of Light in the works for next year, I wanted a piece of my Paris. NOW. So I decided to make boeuf bourguignon.

I had read Julia Child's version, but despite having the week off from work, I did not want to spend quite that much time preparing dinner. I also wanted a recipe that did not involve frying bacon in butter... Luckily for me, Linda Danniberg's "Paris Bistro Cooking" offered a traditional, yet non-heart-attack-inducing version of the famous recipe. It still requires a bit of work, so you might want to save it for weekends, when you can take your time.

As the name says, this stew of beef braised in red wine comes from the Burgundy region of France. It started out as a peasant dish, but it has become a standard of French cuisine. Let's face it: when a dish is as hearty, filling and tasty, it ought to be a classic. This makes 4 to 6 helpings, and it's ridiculously easy to pull off.

1 1/2 pound stewing beef, cut into large cubes
2 tablespoons olive oil
4 tablespoons cognac
1 tablespoon butter
2 small onions, cut into wedges
3 or 4 garlic cloves, chopped
3 medium carrots, cut into sticks
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
4 cups red wine, preferably Burgundy (or Chianti, if you can't find Burgundy)
1 cup water
2 tablespoons tomato paste
1/2 pound button mushrooms (if using slightly bigger mushrooms, like cremini, half or quarter them depending on their size)
1 bouquet garni (1 sprig each of parsley and thyme and 1 bay leaf, tied in a square of cheesecloth)
Sea salt and ground pepper

Brown the meat in the oil in a heavy-bottomed casserole.

Drain off the fat. Add the cognac and ignite carefully. When the flames subside, remove the meat. Add the butter to the casserole and brown the onions, garlic and carrots over medium-high heat.

Sprinkle in the flour, stirring well. Add the wine and water and stir in the tomato paste, mushrooms, bouquet garni and the salt and pepper, scrapping the bottom and sides of the pan to loosen the browned meat juices.

Return the meat to the casserole, bring to a boil. Cover and lower the heat; simmer for about 2 hours, until the meat is tender. Skim off any surface fat and remove the bouquet garni.

Serve with steamed or boiled potatoes and buttered peas.

I must confess that one of the things that I find truly awesome about a recipe like boeuf bourguignon is that it offers me an opportunity to legitimately set something on fire in my kitchen... The flame was not really impressive, but the smell was incredible! Actually, my kitchen smelled awesome for the whole 2 hours of stewing. Sweet torture...

Julia Child called this the best beef dish ever. I don't agree with her all that often, but boeuf bourguignon really is an amazing dish. The meat is sweet and tender from stewing in wine, and the veggies are wonderfully flavored. It should be subtly seasoned, but not too sharp: add a teaspoon of dried thyme and be generous with freshly ground black pepper if you want to heighten the flavors, but be careful not to over do it. A full-bodied red wine goes well with boeuf bourguignon, such as the Burgundy used for cooking, but a Chianti or Merlot will also be a wonderful match.

Some bulk stores sell bouquet garni pre-made, but if you are making them at home, I suggest you buy some fresh parley and thyme, prepare a bunch of bouquet garni and put the ones you are not using in a sealable bag in the freezer. You'll be happy to have them handy the next time you make a stew or hearty pasta sauce.

While my Paris blues will never really be cured, eating a nice helping of this lovely traditional dish while watching "Amélie" did make them easier to deal with. The blues can never really take hold of a person with a full stomach...

(Healthy) Breakfast on the Run!

Work has been kind of crazy lately (hence fewer recipes posted... I apologize) and I generally get home completely beat, so I have been trying to maximize my hours of sleep as much as I can. I noticed that if I set up the coffee machine to get it's magic done while I shower, and if breakfast is something I can grab and eat (none of that fancy toasting business - no time to waste!), I can get up almost an entire half hour later!

Being a grown-up with a grown-up job is tough sometimes. Silly office clothes are merely the tip of the iceberg, but let's not change subject. Breakfast food that's quick and awesome is the subject. Focus. I'll bitch about office attire later.

Muffins are a great solutions when mornings are a race against the clock because you literally just pick it up and eat it. But the quality of store-bought muffins always being something highly questionable, I decided to go on a little muffin baking spree, and have delicious and nutritious breakfast food that I can just grab and devour while wrestling with my pencil-skirt.

The two recipes below are from "Vegan with a Vengeance", and they are almost variations on a theme: healthy and raisins. Eating breakfast is important, but eating it on your way to the bus stop is bad. So if you are gonna follow my horrible example, you should at least eat healthy stuff as you chase public transportation around in high-heels (don't forget to throw a fruit in your bag for the bus ride and fill your thermos bottle with OJ!).

Both recipes call for you to soak the raisins in hot water. That step is not mandatory though highly recommended. It resurrects the raisins from dried and insignificant fruits to plump and chewy wonders. It won't take any time at all: fill a bowl with hot water and leave the raisins in there while you measure and mix your other ingredients.

I also generally double the recipes, keeping only 6 muffins out and defrosting them overnight as needed, but bake and freeze according to your needs (e.g. if you are one of my brother's friends who eats his weight in food twice a day, don't bother freezing the extra muffins).

Carrot-Raisin Muffins (12)

1/2 cup raisins
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
14 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup soy milk
1/4 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups grated carrots

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Spray a muffin pan with non-stick cooking spray, or grease lightly with canola oil. Soak the raisins in a bowl of hot water. In a large mixing bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt. Create a well in the center and add the milk, oil and vanilla extract; mix with a wooden spoon until just combined. Fold in the grated carrots. Remove the raisins from the water and fold in as well. Fill the muffin tins 3/4 full and bake for 18 to 22 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool on a wire-rack.

The longest part of this recipe is grating the carrots, but it's worth the effort! These muffins are moist, chewy and delicious.

Ginger-Raisin Bran Muffins (12)

1/2 cup raisins
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons ground ginger
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup bran
1 1/4 cup rice or soy milk
1/3 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 cup crystallized ginger

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Lightly grease a twelve-muffin pan. Soak the raisins in hot water to cover, set aside. In a large mixing bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, ginger, cinnamon and salt. Mix in the bran. Create a well in the center and add the rice milk, oil and vanilla. Mix with a wooden spoon just until combined. Drain the raisins and fold them in along with the crystallized ginger. Fill each muffin cup most of the way full and bake for 20 to 22 minutes, until a toothpick or knife inserted in the center comes out clear. Cool on a wire-rack.

This one is slightly more adventurous, with the sweet and zesty crystallized ginger pieces.

Both recipes fill the kitchen with a lovely smell, and though the carrots and the bran make them wholesome, they also taste delicious enough to eat just because they are yummy. Enjoy, but do try to sit down when eating your breakfast!

Carrot Soup... and Some More Carrot Soup

Carrot soup is a concept that was a really hard sell for me. It brought up images of the puréed carrots that are fed to babies and I have to admit that the thought made me queasy. I remember the stuff my mother used to prepare for my siblings when were younger, and it wasn't always pretty. I can safely say that I have outgrown baby food.

I was also afraid of how underwhelming the taste would be. Let's face it, carrot juice tastes bland and, while that may satisfy some hippies, my taste buds need a bit more stimulation than that. Don't get me wrong, I'm more than happy to eat healthy but please, make it taste good! And make it look good too!

However, since carrots are little sticks of health, packed with vitamin A, antioxidants and dietary fibers, it's really worth trying to give them back a bit of glory and preparing them in ways that are really appetizing (and a little more varied than baby carrots dipped in hummus…). I confess I got lazy in that endeavor because my chopping technique is deeply flawed. Cutting up the little orange buggers generally ends up with carrot pieces flying all over the kitchen so I usually chicken out of cutting them by grating them to use as a garnish for salads and a few Asian dishes.

So when my dear friend PL requested I post a carrot-orange-ginger soup recipe, my first thought was: "Not those damn carrots again!!". But, ginger and orange are a match made in Heaven flavor-wise and if you take the great nutritional value of carrots, combined with the vitamin C of the oranges and the wonders of the ginger, you get a winning combo as far as winter soups are concerned. It also turns out to be very low in calories and fat, so I had to concede that the idea was genius (who can say no to low-fat when winter love-handles are starting to show?) and I started working on the perfect combination of flavors.

While I hunted down a good recipe to combine those ingredients, I ran across another delicious blend of flavors I wouldn't have thought to mix with carrots: coconut milk and curry. It's obviously not as low-fat (though low-fat coconut milk is a great choice, as it won't sacrifice the taste), but the spicy kick is great and it has a lovely creamy texture.

My boyfriend and I also couldn't agree on which of the two we liked best so I tried again and again to combine the two recipes and create one ultimate carrot soup, but it was never quite right.  I finally decided to keep the two recipes in my collection and to use whichever one I had the ingredients for in the fridge when I fancied a good soup. Both are easy and quick to make, yummy and comforting. It would be criminal not to share them in the colder months of the year.

The first recipe is based on the one found in Jeanelle Mitchell's "For the Love of Soup", but modified to death. It resurrected into the most awesome wintery comfort food; something to be served to people afflicted with a cold, and to ginger-lovers!

2 tablespoons olive oil
1 large sweet onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves, chopped
4 cups carrots, peeled and chopped
1 thumb-size pieces fresh ginger, chopped
2 cups vegetables broth
1 cup orange juice
1 cup water
1 tablespoon cardamom
1 tablespoon tumeric
Sea salt and ground pepper
2 tablespoons cilantro or chives, chopped
1/2 cup sour cream or plain yogurt (optional)

In a large saucepan or stock pot, heat up the olive oil. Add the garlic, onion and carrot and sauté until the onion is soft and golden, 6 to 8 minutes. Stir in the ginger, tumeric and cardamom, and fry for another 2 to 3 minutes. Add the vegetable broth and orange juice and water and bring to a boil. Lower the heat, cover and simmer for 20 minutes, until the carrots are tender. Remove from the heat and let cool for about 5 minutes. Using an immersion blender, pulse the soup until smooth and creamy. Put back on the heat, season with salt and pepper to taste and simmer until heated. Serve with a dollop of yogurt or sour cream and a sprinkling of cilantro or chives.

Obviously, omit the yogurt or sour cream, and you have a gorgeous vegan soup. I find the garnish doesn't add or subtract to the equation, so it really is up to personal taste and to whether or not you count the calories.

The second recipe is from my dear Isa Chandra Moskowitz's "Vegan With a Vengeance". As it has a creamier texture than the previous one, it somehow feels a bit more elegant. You can save the fancier bowls for this one, but it tastes just as great in the more casual ones.

4 cups carrots, peeled and diced

1 large onion, chopped
2 tablespoons peanut or olive oil
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 to 1 1/2 tablespoon curry powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
Ground pepper
3 cups vegetable broth
1 (13 ounce) can coconut milk
1 tablespoon maple syrup

In a stock pot over medium heat, cook the carrots and onions in the oil for 7 to 10 minutes, stirring occasionally until the onions have browned. Add the garlic, curry powder, salt and a few dashes of ground pepper. Sauté for 1 more minute. Add the broth, cover and bring to a boil. Lower the heat and simmer for 10 to 12 minutes, or until the carrots are tender. Add the coconut milk and bring to a boil. Turn the heat off. Use an immersion-blender to purée the soup until it has the desired texture. Stir in the maple syrup and serve.

Double the curry powder if you want it spicy. I prefer to keep it moderate because I don't want to drown out the coconut flavor, but that's just me!

Beef them up with a slice of nice crusty bread and an uber-simple salad of mixed green or a garden salad. You can't get a healthier meal than that! Since both recipes wield 4 to 6 servings and reheat very well, I love to take those soups as lunches alongside a sandwich. You can double the quantities and freeze your left overs; they will keep for a couple of months in a sealed plastic container.

A very big thank you goes to PL, for breaking my prejudiced idea that carrot soup is boring. Now I know that a bit of original spicing takes it from "uninspiring" to "divine"!