« Pot-au-feu » — "pot on the fire" — is a strange expression, don't you think? Here's what a recent edition of the Larousse Gastronomique food and cooking encyclopedia says about it:
Pot-au-feu
This one-pot meal of boiled beef is a specifically French dish that produces both a soup (a clear bouillon), boiled meat (primarily beef), and boiled vegetables (both root vegetables and leafy green vegetables). There are many variations on the theme, as there are with other dishes — boiled pork (la potée), other soups, or boiled chicken (la poule au pot) — that are cooked in a wide, deep soup pot in which the ingredients simmer together in water with herbs and spices. To make a good pot-au-feu, it's a good idea to include several cuts of meat with different tastes and textures — some lean, some with more fat, and some gelatinous. Thick slices of beef shank bones provide marrow as a good accompaniment.
This one-pot meal of boiled beef is a specifically French dish that produces both a soup (a clear bouillon), boiled meat (primarily beef), and boiled vegetables (both root vegetables and leafy green vegetables). There are many variations on the theme, as there are with other dishes — boiled pork (la potée), other soups, or boiled chicken (la poule au pot) — that are cooked in a wide, deep soup pot in which the ingredients simmer together in water with herbs and spices. To make a good pot-au-feu, it's a good idea to include several cuts of meat with different tastes and textures — some lean, some with more fat, and some gelatinous. Thick slices of beef shank bones provide marrow as a good accompaniment.
This is not fancy food, but it can be delicious and satisfying. The LG goes on to explain that potatoes are optional in or with the pot-au-feu. We made boiled beef and vegetables yesterday in the slow-cooker — beef shank with carrots, onions, leeks, and celery. It seemed like the kind of meal that would help protect us from the ill effects of our recent chilly, damp weather. Instead of potatoes, we cooked topinambours à l'étuvee (browned and braised Jerusalem artichokes) as a side dish. Don't forget the bread, red wine, and Dijon mustard!
Pot-au-feu is my all-time favorite French food. I know it's not grand, but it is so tasty. I didn't know the recipe called for different cuts of beef.
ReplyDeleteAnd we didn't do that — we used only beef shank (jarret de bœuf) because we didn't want to cook so much meat and have so much left over. That's why I said "it's a good idea" to put in several different cuts of meat, but it's certainly not required. Once a French woman we know made us a pot-au-feu with beef tongue only (plus vegetables of course). When she invited us she asked if we liked pot-au-feu made with beef tongue, and we said yes, thinking that tongue would be one cut of beef in the soup with others. We were surprised but it was very good.
Delete”Pot on the fire” is standard in the dis-UK, too....
ReplyDeleteIrish stew, Scotch broth (in its true form is exactly like this) and Lancashire hotpot....
when all you had was a range with a pot hanger, one pot cooking was the norm.
In Yorkshire they do a “stewpot”... where the broth is served first as soup with hunks of bread...
the meat and veg is served up in a batter pudding.
It is as you say “delicious and satisfying”.... real comfort food!!
I don’t think that such styles of cooking... as ancient as they are... will ever die out.
The big casserole on the stove to start, then the oven to finish, has been replaced in most household by a slow cooker... freeing up the oven for other goodies.
One word about Scotch broth... now known mainly as a soup... is in its original form a one pot meal.... mutton or beef, swedes, onions, potatoes, carrots... a sprig of bog myrtle would make it really authentic, but nowadays it’ll be a bay leaf.... and “wild mountain thyme”, salt and pepper to taste. In the crofts, the liquid was often the going-over small beer because it was a “waste not, want not” dish.
When we were growing up, 800 miles apart (NY and NC), my mother and Walt's mother both made oven-cooked chuck roasts with root vegetables in the oven. They were slow-cooked. I think it's American to "braise" beef this way in the oven rather on top of the stove. The result is very much like pot-au-feu but you end up with a lot less broth. I remember the beef being very tender and succulent. There's something called a New England Boiled Dinner, but I have no experience of that. My mother used to cook flounder (a fish that can weigh 3 or 4 lbs.) in the oven exactly the way, except with a few strips of our U.S. "streaky" bacon (think lardons) laid over the fish for flavor.
DeleteI've had pot au feu made with tongue a number of times in restaurants here. I've got a couple of pieces of beef shank and some ribs in the freezer waiting for me to make pot au feu.
ReplyDeleteSame here, but they are in the fridge.... for next weeks meals!!
DeleteWhen I was a young one, many decades ago, we used to have pot-au-feu every so often in winter time, and we loved to faire chabrot, in a more elegant way, that is! Invariably, what was left of the dish was made into a bœuf mode, no ice cream involved!
ReplyDeleteNew England boiled dinner, as I remember, is fairly bland. Use of seasonings other than salt and pepper really didn't get much traction in the US until Julia Child had been around for a few TV seasons.
ReplyDelete