![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
The liveliness of my cooking tonight...
Jan. 5th, 2013 09:54 pm...is appropriate to my level of still-sick energy: making ersatz demi-glace.
True demi-glace requires equal portions of Sauce Espagnole and beef or veal stock, with some added herbs (in the form of a bouquet garni), then reduce for an hour and a half. Emeril Lagasse offers a classic version.
However, we're reading Anthony Bourdain's Les Halles Cookbook, which offers a much easier version: 3-to-1 stock (dark, beef or veal) to red wine, plus some chopped up shallots.
We had stock (thawed at New Year's Eve for a port and wine reduction, but not re-frozen...'cuz the freezer's too full). Had wine (some leftover, and we uncorked a bottle of something Italian for the remainder). Had two large and one small shallot.
Toss the shallots, cleaned and chopped, in with the wine. Bring to boil over high heat and reduce by half. Add the beef stock (in our case, 3 quarts stock to 1 quart wine). Bring to simmer and leave. it. alone. For quite a while, or until it's reduced to a rich brown loveliness. (Every now and then, I bestir myself to go over and look at it.)
When reduced enough, strain through a colander lined with cheese cloth. Cool in a bowl set into an ice bath.
Then use the Julia Child trick: fill ice cube trays (where did the ice bath come from, anyway?) with cooled stock. Freeze, then toss cubes into a zip-lock bag for storage (because we have a self-cleaning freezer and we don't want to see the demi-glace disappear). To add richness to soups, stews, and sauces, use as many cubes of demi-glace as appropriate.
While not the true demi-glace mother sauce, Bourdain claims that this will certainly do the trick (and means we don't have to make half of the stock into a Sauce Espagnole, first). We're certainly willing to give it a shot, since we're working with leftover stock, anyway!
True demi-glace requires equal portions of Sauce Espagnole and beef or veal stock, with some added herbs (in the form of a bouquet garni), then reduce for an hour and a half. Emeril Lagasse offers a classic version.
However, we're reading Anthony Bourdain's Les Halles Cookbook, which offers a much easier version: 3-to-1 stock (dark, beef or veal) to red wine, plus some chopped up shallots.
We had stock (thawed at New Year's Eve for a port and wine reduction, but not re-frozen...'cuz the freezer's too full). Had wine (some leftover, and we uncorked a bottle of something Italian for the remainder). Had two large and one small shallot.
Toss the shallots, cleaned and chopped, in with the wine. Bring to boil over high heat and reduce by half. Add the beef stock (in our case, 3 quarts stock to 1 quart wine). Bring to simmer and leave. it. alone. For quite a while, or until it's reduced to a rich brown loveliness. (Every now and then, I bestir myself to go over and look at it.)
When reduced enough, strain through a colander lined with cheese cloth. Cool in a bowl set into an ice bath.
Then use the Julia Child trick: fill ice cube trays (where did the ice bath come from, anyway?) with cooled stock. Freeze, then toss cubes into a zip-lock bag for storage (because we have a self-cleaning freezer and we don't want to see the demi-glace disappear). To add richness to soups, stews, and sauces, use as many cubes of demi-glace as appropriate.
While not the true demi-glace mother sauce, Bourdain claims that this will certainly do the trick (and means we don't have to make half of the stock into a Sauce Espagnole, first). We're certainly willing to give it a shot, since we're working with leftover stock, anyway!