Stewed beef with French red wine is a classic in French cuisine. It originated from a cottage dish in Burgundy and later became a high-class dish in France. Julia Child praised this dish very much in her masterpiece Mastering French Cuisine, calling it "one of the most delicious dishes created by human beings", and gave a very detailed description of the making process and matters needing attention. Even so, it is not an easy task to make a red wine beef that truly impressed the family. As a slow stew, the most common problem of red wine beef is drying and turning into firewood. On the one hand, this is related to some details in the cooking process, on the other hand, it also depends on the choice of beef parts. Those parts with rich connective tissue, such as beef breast, bone and brisket, are most suitable for cooking this kind of food, while the thin parts, such as beef legs and tenderloin, only lose a little fat after cooking for a long time, and the taste naturally becomes dry and hard. Of course, there is a more radical way, that is, simply replace beef with mutton. Compared with beef in the same position, mutton is tender, the cooking time is shorter, the sauce is easier to penetrate into mutton, and the taste is soft and fragrant, which can make people fully experience the rich and full taste of red wine dishes.

French classic braised mutton with red wine

The list of raw materials is as follows (2-3 people):

1) shoulder meat: 680g, cut into 5cm square cubes.

2) Carrots: Half, peeled and sliced.

3) Onion: half, sliced.

4) Bacon: 85g

5) Peanut oil: 10g (fried bacon) +7g (fried mushrooms).

6) Flour:10g

7) Salt: 3g

8) Pepper: Appropriate amount

9) Red wine: 340g.

10) Inventory: 300g

1 1) tomato sauce: 8g.

12) Garlic: 1 petal, crushed.

13) laurel leaf: half a piece.

14) 250g of Lentinus edodes

15) butter: 14g

16) Thyme: 3-4 branches.

16) coriander: decorative.

France classic red wine stewed mutton

The first step is the pretreatment of mutton. The cut shoulder meat is like this. You can notice that the mutton in this part is fat and thin, and the connective tissue is rich. This kind of meat won't dry and turn into firewood after slow stewing.

Peel and slice half a carrot and half an onion.

Cut 85 grams of bacon into half a centimeter wide and four centimeters long. Bacon plays a dual role in this dish. On the one hand, mutton should be fried with the oil of bacon to add a layer of flavor. On the other hand, fried bacon itself is also an important ingredient. The best tool for cooking mutton (beef) with red wine is the French cast iron pot, which looks similar to the traditional casserole in China. It doesn't matter without this pot. It can be directly replaced by a casserole (which can be dried for a short time and of course fried) or other pan with a cover.

Preheat the pan a little, pour in 14g peanut oil, then pour in the chopped bacon and stir fry until the bacon separates out oil and the surface becomes a little golden.