beef bourguignon
At Lunch: Edition #15 - 12/5/2025
over a couple of slices and a Sicilian red.
Missed a couple weeks, but we’re back now. Don’t forget to sit up straight.
The Bite
Reflection round ups.
An easy one this week, here are my top ten albums of the year. Not my Spotify wrapped but a hand selected list.
I always recommend doing a look back at the year like this. Your music, your reads, your photos, your wins, whatever you’re into do a round up. It’s good for soul.
Put on an album, make dinner, drink wine. Perfect.
2025 Top Ten
Mayhem - Lady Gaga
occulto 001 - Cain Culto
Forget In Mass - Deki Alem
Everybody Scream - Florence + the Machine
Who Let The Dogs Out - Lambrini Girls
Haimalina - Aeon
V - Niia
Lotus - Little Simz
From the Pyre - The Last Dinner Party
Do Not Disturb - Young Miko
The Apéritif
Lando Norris is the Formula 1 world champion. His first sit down interview after clinching the title is worth a watch. He’s radiating gratitude and pure joy, it’s a little pick me up.
On the topic of F1 here’s a $1,400 F1 book — just dropping some inspo for anyone wants to get me a Christmas gift that’s stupid expensive just for kicks.
The Take Home Meal
beef bourguignon.
This a new essential meal for me. I had never had it until a few years ago, but I always knew it was the kind of meal I could get down with. It’s a warm and homey, classic meal but it’s also kinda sexy and impressive….yeah for sure.
The first time I had it was in Paris in 2023 in this little restaurant where we sat for dinner at 9:30 pm. To be honest, it wasn’t that good. A bit of a let down, but I didn’t let that discourage me. I knew this was my kinda meal. The second time I had it was in Philly at Parc. And again I was disappointed.
So I just decided to make it myself. My philosophy is that if you like to eat it, you should know how to make it (for the most part) so I figured I may as well get a jump on that.
I started with my girl Julia Child, and then read a bunch of other methods, techniques and ingredients and this is where I landed.
beef bourguignon.
Ingredients (serves 6, or two people with a few days of leftovers.)
beef cubes (2.5 lbs - I use the already cubed ones from Costco because it’s easy and still cheapish. Make them roughly 2 inch chunks.)
carrots - (4-5? use your judgement, how much do you like carrots?)
onion (1-1.5 big one)
mushrooms, baby bells, white, follow your heart. (like a whole pack.)
red wine, Burgundy or Cabernet (2 cups)
beef stock (4 cups)
bacon (8 strips)
garlic (a lot, a whole handful. always more rather than less, this is US garlic we’re talking about, it’s nowhere near as potent Italian anything.)
How you do it:
prep
cube your beef if it isn’t already
chop up like 8 strips of bacon into tiny but substantial pieces
put a rough chop the big onion
cut the carrots into bite-sized bits
clean your garlic
Pre-heat the oven to 450, don’t forget mine takes 8 years to heat.
crisp up the bacon in a dutch oven, then set aside
Once you removed the back, make sure you remove some of the bacon grease before searing the beef cubes. Too much grease can mix with meat juices and give your beed more of a boil than a good sear. This is a no go.
Drop in the beef cubes and sear on all sides. Do it in batches to not over crowd the pan. Take them out and set aside.
Put the onion and carrots in the pan and cook down.
Add back in the beef and the bacon and coat in flour. Like a good coating of flour, we want those cubes to crisp up.
Put the dutch oven, uncovered, in the regular oven and cook for 4 minutes.
Take it out, mix it up and throw it back in for another 4 minutes.
Take it out and add the beef stock, wine, garlic, bay leaves, oregano, pepper. Cover it and put it back in the oven at 325 for at least 3 hours. It needs it.
On the stove top, sauté the mushrooms and add them once you take out the pot.
Serve it with mashed potatoes in a bowl.
Thank me later
Considerations:
This dish normally includes pearl onions, but I can never find them at the grocery stores around me so they’re not here. Make them separately and add them later like the mushrooms.