Daube is a stew of beef slow cooked in wine, the dish originated from the south of France. Beef cheeks are the hard working muscles on the face of the cow/bull, it is a tasteful cut with wonderful gelatinous buttery texture provided its cooked slowly & gently.

Adapted this recipe from Justin North’s “French Lessons“. Justin North is chef owner of Becasse, Plan B & Etch. He has been cooking since he was 15 years old & has trained under great chefs like Raymond Blanc at Le Manoir aux Quat’ Saisons & Liam Tomlin at Banc. I met him briefly & asked a question during Sydney Morning Herald’s “Good Food Month” Molecular gastronomy event, at the Powerhouse museum sydney october 2008. He seems to be a great bloke, his food at Becasse & Plan B rocks. Plan B does the most amazing wagyu beef burger for only $10.

For the daube

• 4 x 300g beef cheeks
• 1 onion
• 1 carrot
• 1 celery stick
• 6 garlic cloves
• 6 sprigs of thyme(love it)
• 1 bay leaf(1 bay leaf goes a long way)
• 1 litre red wine(I used a bottle of McGuigan’s estate red wine blend, it was in a 1 litre bottle)
• 500 ml port(I used a DeBortoli tawny port)
• Plain flour for dusting cheeks
• 4 tbsps olive oil
• 2 litres brown veal or beef stock
• Salt & pepper

1. Place the cheeks in marinading container.
2. Chop roughly the onion, carrot & celery. Add to the marinading container with the cheeks. Also add the garlic & herbs.
3. Combine port & red wine in saucepan, heat to the boil. Lower heat and simmer until reduced by half.Allow to cool until lukewarm, add to marinading container.
4. Leave marinade to cool to room temperature, then cover and refrigerate. Leave to marinate for 24hrs.
5. Next day, preheat oven to 140 degrees. Strain beef, vegetables & herbs. Set aside the vegetables & herbs and reserve the marinade.
6. Lightly dust the beef cheeks with flour.(Flour used to prevent cheeks from burning when browning, not thickening)
7. Heat oil in large casserole pan, brown beef cheeks until browned evenly. Set cheeks aside.
8. Add the reserved vegetables to pan & brown evenly. Add marinade to pan and bring to the boil. Lower heat & simmer until liquid is reduced by half.
9. In another pan bring the brown veal or beef stock to boil.
10. Add beef cheeks, herbs & stock to casserole pan. Bring it to gentle simmer.
11. Cover tightly casserole pan with a lid. Braise in oven for 4 hours.

Serve the daube of beef cheeks with baby roasted carrots & potato puree.

Pithiviers are a speciality from the town of Pithiviers in the south of France. They are usually served as coffee cakes. The traditional filling is an almond cream mixture with a hint of rum.

This recipe is adapted from Liam Tomlin’s book “Season to Taste”. Liam Tomlin is current executive chef at Cape Grace,Cape Town and former head chef of famed but now closed sydney restaurant Banc. His proteges at Banc have become prominent Australian restauranteurs; Chui Lee Luke at Claude’s, Justin North at Becasse, Peter Sheppard at Caveau, Warren Turnbull at Assiette , Matthew Kemp at Restaurant Balzac.

To make this pithiviers you need the following.

Puff Pastry

I took the easy way out & bought frozen puff pastry from the supermarket.

2. Roll out the puff pastry
3. Use a 8 cm pastry cutter to cut round bases and tops for the pithiviers.
4. Place tops and bases in the fridge for 30 minutes for pastry to rest before assembling the pithiviers

Creme patissiere (Pastry Cream)

• 1 Egg yolk
• 125 mls milk
• 2 1/2 tbsps plain flour
• 35 grams caster sugar
• 1/4 tsp vanilla essence

2. Combine milk and vanilla essence in sauce pan bring to boil, then set aside.
3. In a bowl, combine egg yolks and sugar then whisk it silly. It will take a while. What you want is a mixture very pale, double in volume, thick consistency. Mixture should come down like a ribbon off the whisk(hard to explain)
4. Fold flour into egg yolks sugar mixture.
5. Take 1/3 of milk mixture, combine into egg sugar mixture in bowl.
6. Add egg sugar mixture from bowl, add to saucepan contain milk mixture.
7. Place saucepan on medium heat, whisk slowly until it thickens to shiny thick custard. This takes about 5 minutes. Set aside.

Chocolate almond filling

• 100 grams dark chocolate
• 55 grams caster sugar
• 55 grams almond meal
• 1 tbsp cocoa powder
• 1 egg

2. Melt chocolate over a bain-marie(bowl over simmering water)
3. Cream together butter & sugar. Then stir in the egg, almond meal and cocoa powder. Add the melted chocolate and mix until the chocolate is fully incorporated.
4. Refrigerate for 1 hour until reasonably firm to mold into patties that about 6 cm in diameter. Freeze patties until ready to use.

Chocolate sauce

• 50 grams dark chocolate
• 75 mls cream
• 25 grams unsalted butter

2. Bring cream to boil.
3. Add chunks of chocolate into hot cream & incorporate it.
4. Finish it off with the butter & set aside

Assembly

• Place pastry base on floured surface, put a chocolate almond patty into the centre of the pastry bases. Brush the edge of base with egg wash.
• Place a pastry top over the chocolate patty and mould it around the patty removing any air pockets between patty & filling.
• Mark a pattern on pithivier with the tip of a knife
• Brush with egg wash then refrigerate for 30 minutes.
• Mark border with back of knife. Preheat oven to 220 degrees centigrade. Refrigerate again for 30 minutes.
• Bake pithiviers for about 15 minutes until crisp & golden

Serve with chocolate sauce & vanilla ice cream