Daube provençale (Provençal beef and red wine stew)
Beef marinated overnight in red wine with thyme, bay, carrots and a strip of orange peel, then braised for three hours with tomatoes until it falls apart, with black olives stirred in at the end. Start it the day before: the marinade is what makes it a daube.
- Time
- 225 min (30 prep + 195 cook)
- Servings
- 4
- Per serving
- 563 kcal
- Protein
- 62 g
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 lb beef shank, boneless beef shin (gîte), trimmed, in 5 cm (2-inch) chunks; weighed raw (about 700 g once braised)
- 1 1/2 cups + 1 tbsp red wine, a robust dry red such as Côtes du Rhône
- 4 large carrots, in thick slices
- 2 medium onions, chopped
- 5 cloves garlic, crushed
- 3 wide strips orange zest, pared with a peeler
- 6 sprigs fresh thyme
- 2 leaves bay leaf
- 2 tbsp olive oil
- 1 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1 can (14 oz) diced tomatoes
- 3/4 cup + 2 tbsp beef broth
- 3/4 cup black olives, pitted, Niçoise if you can find them
- 3 tbsp fresh parsley, chopped
Steps
- The day before, put the beef in a large bowl or container with the wine, carrots, onion, garlic, orange zest, thyme and bay. Turn everything together, cover and refrigerate for 12 to 24 hours, turning once if you can.
- Lift the beef out and pat it very dry, keeping the marinade and vegetables. Heat the oven to 300°F. Heat the oil in a heavy casserole over high heat and brown the beef well on all sides in two batches, about 8 minutes in all. Lift out.
- Pour the marinade and its vegetables into the casserole and boil for 5 minutes, scraping up the brown bits. Return the beef with the salt, pepper, tomatoes and broth. Bring to a simmer, cover tightly and braise in the oven for 3 hours, until the beef falls apart under a fork.
- Pick out the orange strips, thyme stems and bay. If the sauce is thin, simmer uncovered for 10 minutes before the olives. Stir in the olives and let the stew stand for 10 minutes off the heat, then scatter with the parsley. Taste before adding any more salt, because the olives bring their own.
- Serve with pasta or boiled potatoes. It tastes even better the next day. It keeps 4 days in the fridge and freezes for 3 months.
Good to know
Can I skip the overnight marinade?
It will still be a good stew, but the wine will taste sharper and the meat less deeply seasoned. Marinate for at least 4 hours if you are short of time.
Can I use chuck instead?
Yes, chuck (paleron) is softer and richer, at about 53 instead of 72 if you use it all through. Many cooks mix the two, and the shin is what gives the sauce its body.
Alternative
Per
- Calories
- 92
- Protein
- (46%)
- 10 g
- Fat
- (38%)
- 4 g
- Carbohydrates
- (16%)
- 4 g
- of which sugar
- 2 g
- Fiber
- 1 g
- Sodium
- 229 mg
About 5% of the alcohol remains after cooking; the label counts only that.
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Computed from the ingredients with our published formula, not yet kitchen-tested. How
As written, 2251 kcal goes into the pot and 2470 g of ingredients comes out as about 2450 g of food: 92 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water and energy density is the score's biggest lever, so the dish is scored as cooked, not as an average of its parts. Every ingredient links to its food page, with the same data and score. The label's percentages are each macronutrient's share of the calories. The full formula.