Stew

It's an overlooked meal, I think. Or maybe just too ordinary to really get much notice. But stew is pretty much common to all cuisines in one form or another; it's how our ancestors dealt with a pantry whose components were coming to a rapid end and needed to be used. It's called curry in India, tagine in Morocco, bourguignon in France and sukiyaki in Japan, but it's basically stuff shoveled together into a pot with a liquid and simmered for a mite, preferably accompanied by some mind-altering beverage while you're doing it. Low maintenance, high yield.

This one I propose to you here is very simple and has a minimum of exoticness. I guess it's just an all-around one-pot dish that happens to star beef. I'm going on the American or European model here, so let's think Western. But it need not be bland. Let's look at the ingredients: we like garlic. We like onion. We like potatoes. We like top sirloin. We like butter and we love wine.

So here's the list:

Meez:

Four nice cloves garlic, finely chopped
One large or two medium Vidalia onions, roughly chopped
Two or three large carrots, sliced in rounds
Three Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and sliced into 1/2 inch cubes
A couple of pounds of top sirloin, cut in generous 3/4 to one-inch cubes
A cup of full-bodied red wine, like a Merlot or Bordeaux
4 cups of chicken stock
1/4-1/2 cup of parsley (Italian or broadleaf is best)
1 cup kernel corn
1 cup green peas (miniature is good)
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2 tablespoons brown sugar
4 teaspoons olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
Herbes de Provence to taste (thyme especially)

Check out the video for visual directions, but basically, the method is this:

Don't get anal about this recipe—just put in the amount of stuff that you like. Get everything chopped and diced beforehand. Trust me, it's just easier. Put a couple of teaspoons of olive oil into a wide sauté pan and blast it. Toss in the meat, but let it stay on one side for two or three minutes—we're not looking to cook it, but to get a good fond and caramelisation. The meat will be nicely browned—like I say in the video, don't let it boil, we want it to sear, so dump the juices in the vegetable bowl if they get too much—in about ten minutes, if you're doing it right. Sprinkle salt and pepper on it while it sears. Remove from the pan and set aside in a bowl. Now add a couple of tablespoons of olive oil to the hot pan and sauté the onions and carrots on medium high for about ten minutes, then add the garlic. Cook for two minutes more. Put aside in the bowl with the meat.

Pour the wine into the pan you just made the meat in and bring it to a boil for a couple of minutes. Put that into the bowl with all the rest. Now, you will need a clean pan for the potatoes, so wash it out. Melt the butter and add the potatoes when the pan is not quite smoking. Watch the potatoes very carefully, but once they're in the pan, don't turn them over for about 5 minutes. Don't worry, at this point if you're doing it right, the butter won't burn. Now turn the potatoes over so that the other side can brown. This is labor-intensive, but worth it.

We're almost done . . . after about 15 minutes of sautéing the potatoes, add the parsley after turning off the heat.

Now fire up your soup pan—a pot for pasta is good. Put all the ingredients except for the potatoes and parsley into it, adding the chicken broth and tomato paste. It's all downhill from here. About 25 minutes before you plan to eat, add the potato-parsley mixture. Thicken with cornstarch, demiglace powder or onion soup mix. You're gonna be loving this one.