Red Wine Sauce and Great Beef

[Chuck]

Hi all,

Something a bit different to go with that great red wine.

I have been searching for the holy grail of Aussie steak after enjoying an Iowa grain fed in 1998. I think I've found it!!!

These guys - Coorong Angus Beef manage their beef from the cradle to the customer and it is really something. It actual has that country flavour I love. Heaps of marbling and fat that give it its unique flavour. The web site is below and I've added a red wine sauce to die for coaxed out of the chef at Bridgewater Mill.

Red Wine Sauce – serves 2

- 3 -4 TBS Shallots (not spring onions) finely diced.

- 3 TBS extra virgin olive oil.

- Plenty of butter; bugger the cholesterol. IÂ’d much rather die early a contented man than live a long unfulfilled life. Go for a jog the next day to make up.

- 1 -2 TBS castor sugar depending on level of sweetness you like

- Say 300 - 400ml red wine you would drink. Nothing cheap and ordinary. It is the sauceÂ’s base.

- Say 30 -40ml port, tawny or vintage. Vary to taste

- 300 – 400ml good beef stock. I have found the Continental liquid good but you can’t beat home made.

Place Shallots, castor sugar, butter and olive oil in heavy base large pan and cook on very low heat for say 10 -15 minutes until the shallots have caramelised (lightly browned but no black as it can impart a burnt taste).

Add red wine and port and turn up heat to high.

Reduce to about 10 - 20% (or lower) of volume. This concentrates the flavour and is the key to its intense flavour allowing only a few TBS for each person and stops it running into the veges and making a soup. When cooled it should by have a runny light cream consistency. This was my early mistake. The sauce was too runny and lacked concentration.

Pour thru sieve, place in small pot, and set aside while the steaks are cooked.

When ready to serve reheat sauce (not to boiling) and add a small splash of wine to freshen the flavour and a good TBS or so of butter. Too hot and the butter will separate. Mix thru and the butter will thicken and make the sauce shine. Perhaps take it off the heat before adding the butter.

Serve and enjoy.

Chuck


www.coorongangusbeef.com.au

[markg]

Thanks for the tip Chuck, I think I might rustle up some of that thar steak from the central market next week and give it a try.

[Gavin Trott]

Thanks for the tip Chuck, I think I might rustle up some of that thar steak from the central market next week and give it a try.

Me too, I shop at the market every Saturday, to Feast it is!!!!!

[davidg]

I have a slight variant which is a regular in my household:

More-or-less the same but with the addition of field mushrooms.
I take some of that butter and saute some finely chopped, field mushrooms (I go for pine mushrooms if they are in season), add the wine and allow it to reduce by about half, sieve, and then use the wine and mushroom juice inplace of the wine in the recipe provided.

[markg]

pine mushrooms ..

Keh ??

[Kieran]

Funny, grubby-looking orange-coloured mushrooms. Occasionally found at really good greengrocers, like our local Harris Farm.

Kieran

[Chuck]

Thanks Markg. I'll try that variant. Mushies, particularly the 1960's version might add a different slant!!

Chuck

[davidg]

Funny, grubby-looking orange-coloured mushrooms. Occasionally found at really good greengrocers, like our local Harris Farm.

Kieran

You get a more delicate flavour than you would get with a field mushroom. Most of the year I use large flat field mushrooms or mature button mushrooms. Pine mushrooms are generally a bonus during the short period in Autumn when they are in season.

But enough non-wine talk....

[707]

Chuck, I've got another steak for you to try, Mayura Station (near Millicent) Wagyu beef. I've had it when I've been in Coonawarra so not sure of distribution in Adelaide, you might have to give the station owner Scott DeBruin a call if you are really on a Holy Grail.