Philippe Etchebest’s inescapable recipe and the chef’s tips

Who has never salivated while passing through Grandma’s kitchen, while the sweet aroma of a pot-au-feu quietly simmering in her pot floated in the kitchen? The stew is a winter dish, emblematic of French gastronomy. Comforting and hearty, this dish consists of beef cooked for a long time over low heat in a broth with vegetables (carrots, turnips, leeks, potatoes, etc.). You can also add a little white wine to flavor it. Bonus, it’s a dish that can be prepared in large quantities (notice to fans of batch cooking) and eaten over several days. Some even say it’s even better the next day, reheated.

Economical and easy to prepare, if you have a few basic tips, the pot-au-feu shows that the best things are often the simplest. And that, the starred chef Philippe Etchebest has understood since he dedicated an episode of his Mentor video program to this dish. Here is his recipe, simple and easy to reproduce at home.

Read also: 3 recipes for mini-calorie, comforting and delicious meals inspired by Weight Watchers

Philippe Etchebest’s stew recipe

For 6 persons

Ingredients :

• 2 onions
• 3 potatoes
• 3 carrots
• 1 leek
• 3 turnips
• 6 garlic cloves
• 1.5 kg beef scoter
• 2 tablespoons rapeseed oil
• 20g butter
• 3 liters of water
• 3 sprigs of fresh thyme
• 2 fresh bay leaves
• coarse salt
• 3 marrow bones
• Pepper

Stew recipe

Start by peeling the potatoes with a vegetable peeler. Peel the carrots and then the turnip.

Chef’s tip: Prepare in advance a bowl of water in which you will place the peeled potatoes. The water will keep them from turning black. For the turnip, turn the vegetable on itself by applying the same pressure on the vegetable peeler. The latter should not move. In this way, it is possible to peel it with a single movement.

Then peel the onion and garlic. To make it easier to separate the garlic cloves, press down firmly on the head of garlic. Then cut the pods in 2 and remove the germ. Clean the leek and remove the roots. Cut off the ends of carrots and turnips. Cut the vegetables and one of the onions into large pieces and place them in a bowl. Set aside the potatoes and one of the onions. Cut the remaining onion in half and set aside. Slice the potatoes and put them back in the bowl filled with water. Slice the beef into large strips and then into large chunks.

Put the two onion halves in a separate frying pan and let them burn dry.

Chef’s tip: Both onion halves should burn well, even be charred. These will give a nice color to the broth without giving a burnt taste to the broth in which they will be added.

In a sauté pan, pour a little peanut oil and sear the pieces of beef over high heat.

Chef’s tip: This operation is optional, but it allows you to caramelize the meat and thus bring back the juices which will embellish the broth by giving it more pronounced flavors. The part of beef used here is the scoter, accessible and less expensive. But you can also choose other cuts of beef such as the gite or the chuck that the chef is particularly fond of.

At the same time, heat the water in a large saucepan or pot. It is possible to add white wine at this time according to the desires, it allows to bring a little acidity to the pot-au-feu. When the beef is well seared, add it to the pot of water.

Deglaze the remaining juices in the pan with water or white wine. Using a food brush, lightly rub the bottom of the pan to collect all the juices. Then pour everything into the saucepan or pot containing the beef. Its juices will give a better taste to the preparation.

Collect your well blackened onion halves and add them to the pan with the beef.

Salt and add thyme, bay leaf and pepper.

Chef’s tip: For the pepper, slightly unscrew the pepper pot to obtain large pieces of pepper. It is also possible to take whole pepper and crush it with a knife.

Then simmer over low heat for 2 hours.

After two hours, the preparation will have decanted. You may notice impurities on the surface that need to be removed. To do this, take a ladle and gently remove the impurities on the surface.

Then add the cut vegetables and marrow bones to the saucepan or pot.

Leave to simmer over low heat for another hour, or even an hour and a half, so that the ingredients really have that candied side of the pot-au-feu.

This recipe, chef Philippe Etchebest confirms, is a quick version of what we know from pot-au-feu. With even larger pieces, even whole, it is possible to simmer and cook a pot-au-feu over low heat for a whole day. Nothing better to embalm your home of its sweet fragrance before sitting down at the table in the evening with the family to savor it.