Before the winter is over, I have to share this with you, because this is gooood!

Important. The secret of this otherwise quick and easy to prepare recipe resides in its extremely long cooking: we are talking five hours at the very least. So, you can try it if you are planning to be at home for quite a few hours in a row.

For 4 servings:

- 1 kg good quality chunks of stewing beef
- The original recipe calls for one bottle of good quality strongly coloured red *wine. I have to admit that I used one glass of a very nice Bordeaux wine, then added water whilst the beef was cooking and I did not get any reaction... this time.
I believe it should work very well with about 33cl to half a litre (sorry I'm metric!) of homemade veggie broth, especially if you have put carrots in it, yum! Well, if you cannot tolerate carrots, go for a green veggie broth.
Or a beef stock, with beef bone, carrots, onions, celery, yum! (but I think this one is very long to prepare).
- fresh thyme and rosemary
- 3 whole garlic cloves
- 2 onions, thinly chopped
- 4 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- salt (I find this to be really optional in this dish)

- 1 large pot, cast iron ideally, whatever you have that is large and won't stick

Heat the oil in the pot. Blanch the onions and the garlic cloves.
Add the beef chunks and seal them.
Once they are sealed, add the *wine/the broth, the thyme and rosemary, a pinch of salt, and cook on a high heat until it starts boiling.
At this point, immediately set the heat to its lowest possible setting, cover and leave to cook for 4 hours.

Now, you can catch up on past episodes of your favourite series, invite friends over for a chat, do a bit of gardening...
Check up on the cooking from time to time and stir it a bit. If the broth has evaporated and the beef looks dry, add some broth or stock, a little bit of olive oil, and even some water (especially if you have been naughty and you have used *wine ).

Four hours later, take the lid off and carry on cooking for one hour at medium heat, to reduce the sauce. At the end of the cooking the sauce must be a bit thick.

That's it! Done at last!

So, yes, it is very long to cook, but if you don't have 5 hours ahead of you, you can apparently cook it in two parts, for instance for three hours the first day and two the second, but I have not tried it this way.

As an accompaniment, I prepared a basmati and zucchini risotto, that calls for so much cheese that I will not leave the recipe in here. Plus it is a really bad food combination.
But I also ate it in the past with green beans. Carrots also go well if you can have them.
And it is very nice on its own too.

You can freeze this dish. The best part of it is, the more you re-heat it (on the stove, no the microwave), the better it gets!

If you don't use *wine and you combine this dish with green vegs or eat it on its own, I should think it would be safe for stage one. It would no longer be called "daube", but hey, who cares!

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Tarilee,

Hidey Ho -

I made this for dinner last night & it was delish. Used homemade chix broth & it turned out great. I froze some leftovers for use on rotation later this week. thank you for an easy, slow cooked meal - it's nice when the weather is getting chilly.

chris