Bon Appétit!

So I fearlessly agreed to make the dinner portion for a progressive dinner wherein  each course of the meal is  eaten at a different house.

The RSVP’s started coming in and at final count we are at 36, a small army of people to be served a sit down meal in a house in an hour.

That’s where my dear friend (MDF) comes in and agrees to have the whole lot to her house for the sit down dinner part and total relief sweeps over me.

An all day cooking event made the whole thing worthwhile.  Four of us banded together with a huge chunk of meat and a wheelbarrow full of vegetables and worked for  five hours.

Give Andrew a big hunk of beef to deal with and he is in heaven.  So, he and John cut the beef and seared it etc. for five hours!   MDF and I peeled, chopped and diced the vegetables for five hours!  And I am here to tell you that it takes some really strongly cemented friendships to be in the kitchen chopping, cutting, measuring and cooking for five hours and manage to come out with only one small flesh wound.

And have I ever mentioned Andrew’s total obsession with neat and clean? Have I ever mentioned that he took our freshly cut tree from the woods through the car wash before bringing it into the house?  And have I ever mentioned that I love this about Andrew because I am not fastidious and so we complete one another? Well… our cooking came to a screeching halt about three hours into the event when everything totally shut down so Andrew could clean all five filters of our oven vent.

But back to the cooking.

After seeing Julia and Julie, the Boeuf Bourguignon seemed like the thing to make for thirty-six  people even though I have to resort to a google search every time I spell ‘bourguignon’.  That and  Créme Fraîche mashed potatoes all comfortably nestled in a bowl with a little parsley for garnish.

But thirty-six people, my gosh!, I thought, “nix the créme fraîche, I mean, who’d really know if we used créme fraîche for the mashed potatoes!?”  And then the guilt sets in and MDF is beginning to ask about us doing the créme fraîche and then I begin to research this créme fraîche thing and discover it is actually not that hard to make.  Well, in fact it’s a breeze:

2 cups of whipping cream mixed with 3 Tablespoons of buttermilk in a bowl and then cover with a cloth, a cute cloth mind you, like your kitchen was translated to France, and leave on the counter for about 24 hours in winter (less in summer).  When it thickens, put it in the fridge for up to one week.  The taste is divine!  It is heavenly tangy creaminess that surely everyone will be asking, “¿What is this certain je ne sais quoi?”

And the Boeuf Bourguignon is really a terrifically simple recipe as well:

• 6 oz. thick-cut bacon, diced
• 3 1/2 to 4 lb. chuck roast, cut into 1-inch cubes
• salt and freshly ground pepper, to taste
• 2 small onions, diced
• 2 carrots, peeled and diced
• 2 celery stalks, diced
• 3 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 Tbs. tomato paste
• 3/4 lb.  mushrooms, sliced
• 3 Tbs. Dijon mustard
• 1 bay leaf (though I am skeptical that you can really taste a single little bay leaf in a big old pot of stew, we did use them)
• wine- to taste, maybe a cup or so
• 1 1/2 cups beef broth

In a large sauté pan over medium-high heat, cook the bacon, stirring occasionally, until crisp, 10 to 11 minutes. Drain on paper towels. Pour the bacon fat into a bowl.

Season the beef generously with salt and pepper. Brown in pan on medium-high heat in 2 Tbs. of the bacon fat until well browned, 8 to 10 minutes per batch. Transfer to a bowl.

Reduce the heat to medium and warm 1 Tbs. of the bacon fat in pan. Add the onions, carrots and celery and cook, stirring occasionally, until softened, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic and tomato paste and cook for 1 minute. Add the mushrooms and sauté until lightly browned, 10 to 12 minutes. Stir in the mustard, beef, bacon, bay leaf, broth, salt and pepper and bring to a simmer.  Simmer until the beef is tender.  Serve over Créme Fraîche mashed potatoes.
Serves 6 to 8.

I smelled bouef bourguigon in my sleep, in Andrew’s hair, everywhere.  It permeated the house and stayed for days!  And I have to say, it was a most wonderful smell.  I wonder if  burnt offerings smelled something like this.  I think so.  It was heavenly.