White wine daube Provencale cooked one-pot style.

This white wine daube Provencale is an easy and tasty recipe that can be cooked in a one pot style or in a slow cooker. With a short marinating time and no searing, this recipe is a breeze to cook. Flavours of orange peel, tomato and bacon meld together to create a delicious braised beef. I recommend using chuck steak for this recipe.

INGREDIENTS

• 1 kg of chuck beef or any beef suited for slow cooking

For the Marinade

• 1 shallot finely chopped

• 100 g (3.5 oz) bacon

• Small handful chopped parsley

• 2 garlic cloves crushed

• 100 ml (3.4 fl oz) cognac (sorry, I said on the video 10 ml)

• 200 ml (6.8 fl oz) white wine

• 12 g (0.4 oz) of fine salt

• 6 g (0.2 oz) of black pepper

To cook the beef

• Half an onion finely chopped

• 1 carrot thinly sliced

• A bay leaf

• A twig of fresh thyme

• All of the marinade juice

• 1 glass of brown stock (or an extra glass of wine if you want a real wine taste in your meat)

• 1 tbsp of olives

• 1 garlic clove crushed

• 1 orange or mandarin zest (the original uses dry bitter orange peels)

• 3 chopped tomatoes (peeled and seeded)

• Olive oil

• Some chopped mushrooms (optional)

Cooking time: covered in the oven at 180 °C (356 °F) for 3 hours

NOTES

• Serve the daube with macaroni for the authentic experience but I much prefer tagliatelle.

PROCEDURE

1. Blend the parsley and pureed garlic in a dish or pan. Cover 3 bacon slices on one side with the mix and roll each slice up.

2. Cut the steak into chunky pieces and layer into a bowl. On the first layer sprinkle fresh thyme, place one bay leaf and the 3 bacon rolls and then place the second layer of steak on top of that.

3. Sprinkle a layer of salt and pepper together with the shallot.

4. Pour the cognac and white wine over with a little olive oil and mix the liquids into the top layer of steak.

5. Cover and place in the refrigerator for one to two hours to allow to marinate.

6. Place the meat into a pot or dutch oven, putting the top layer of the marinade in first. On top of that layer, place the bacon rolls, bay leaf and thyme, the orange peel, the onions, the crushed garlic, carrots, tomatoes, olives and if desired, some chopped mushrooms.

7. Cover with the second layer of steak and pour over a glass of the marinade and the stock.

8. Cover the pot and place into the pre-heated oven (180 °C, 356 °F) for non fan and 160 -170 °C (320 -338 °F) for fan oven and cook for between 2.30 – 3 hours, until the meat is ready. During cooking, check from time to time to see if the meat may need turning around. The liquids will reduce during the cooking.

9. When the dish is ready, take out of the oven and remove as much of the fat as possible.

10. I prefer to leave the dish overnight and reheat the next day. This intensifies the flavours. Serve over a bed of hot pasta.