Barolo Braised Beef with Celeriac Purée and Porcini Mushrooms | Brasato al Barolo con Purè di Sedano Rapa e Funghi Porcini

Sep 28

11 min read

Brasato al Barolo con Purè di Sedano Rapa e Funghi Porcini (Barolo Braised Beef with Celeriac Purée and Porcini Mushrooms)

Brasato al Barolo is the Sunday roast of the Langhe: a whole piece of beef cooked for hours in the wine that made those hills famous, until it gives way under a fork and the liquid has turned dark and glossy.

This version keeps the braise as Piedmont makes it and changes only what sits under it. In Alba that is polenta or mashed potato. Here it is a celeriac puree, and that one substitution is the point of the recipe. Celeriac is not a starchy vegetable, it has to be cooked differently to become a puree at all, and its earthy, faintly celery flavour holds its own against a Barolo reduction.

Porcini complete the plate: dried ones in the braising liquid, fresh ones seared for texture. The sauce is thickened by the collagen from the beef alone.

Yield: 6 servings. Marinating: 12 to 24 hours. Prep: 45 minutes. Braising: 3 to 3 1/2 hours. Rest: 40 minutes. Difficulty: intermediate. Region: Piedmont, the Langhe.

The Story

The Langhe are a run of steep clay and marl hills south of Alba, and the wine off their best slopes is Barolo, made from Nebbiolo and nothing else. Nebbiolo ripens late, gives a pale garnet colour that fools people into expecting a light wine, and carries more tannin and acidity than almost anything grown in Italy. Those are what a braise needs: tannin binds to the fat and protein of a tough cut and softens over hours of low heat, and the acidity keeps the sauce from tasting heavy.

Brasato belongs to the Sunday table: the dish of a household with one large pot, set on the coolest corner of a wood stove and left alone until early afternoon. Nobody in the Langhe puts an aged Barolo in the pot. The wine that cooks is young and from the same hills, and the good bottle comes to the table.

Celeriac sits oddly in this landscape. It grows in the Veneto and in Friuli as a winter root, but its real home is central and eastern Europe, where Austria, Poland and Hungary treat it as a staple. The porcino is entirely local: the Alta Langa woods give up boletus edulis from late August into October, dried on frames and kept for exactly the season when a brasato gets made.

Ingredients

For the beef and the marinade

Beef chuck, one whole boneless piece, 3 1/2 lb (1.6 kg)
Young Nebbiolo or Barolo, 1 bottle, 25 fl oz (750 ml)
Yellow onion, medium, 1, carrot, medium, 2, celery stalk, 2
Garlic cloves, crushed, 3, bay leaves, 2, rosemary sprig, 1, sage leaves, 4
Whole cloves, 3, juniper berries, crushed, 6, black peppercorns, 10
Cinnamon stick, a small piece

For the braise

Extra virgin olive oil, 3 tbsp (45 ml), and unsalted butter, 1 tbsp (14 g)
Tomato paste, 1 tbsp (15 g)
Dried porcini, 1/2 oz (15 g), soaked in warm water, 3/4 cup (180 ml)
Beef stock, unsalted, 1 to 1 1/2 cups (240 to 360 ml)
Fine sea salt, 2 tsp (12 g), divided, and black pepper to taste

For the celeriac puree

Celeriac, 2 lb (900 g) unpeeled, about 1 1/2 lb (680 g) trimmed
Whole milk, 1/2 cup (120 ml)
Unsalted butter, cold and diced, 3 oz (85 g)
Fine sea salt, 1 tsp (6 g), lemon juice, 1 tsp (5 ml), white pepper, a pinch

For the porcini garnish

Fresh porcini, firm and dry, 10 oz (285 g)
Extra virgin olive oil, 2 tbsp (30 ml), and unsalted butter, 1 tbsp (14 g)
Garlic clove, crushed, 1, thyme sprig, 1, fine sea salt to taste

For finishing

Flaky sea salt and a few drops of olive oil per plate
Parsley leaves, small, 12

Preparation

Step 1

Trim, tie and marinate. Choose the whole chuck visibly threaded with white connective tissue: that collagen is what turns the liquid into sauce. Trim the hard outer fat to a quarter inch, then tie the piece every inch and a half with butcher twine, or it will open along its seams as the collagen dissolves. Put it in a deep container with the vegetables in rough chunks and all the aromatics, pour over the bottle and refrigerate 12 to 24 hours, unsalted.

Step 2

Soak the porcini, dry the meat, then sear. Cover the dried porcini with warm water for 30 minutes, chop them, then let the liquid settle and pour off all but the gritty last spoonful. Dry the beef hard on every surface, since a wet one steams instead of browning, and strain the marinade keeping wine and vegetables apart. Heat the oil and butter in a heavy casserole just large enough for the piece, season the beef with half the salt and sear every face and both ends, 15 to 20 minutes, untouched for the first 4, until the crust is genuinely dark. Lift the beef out, keeping the brown deposit, and cook the drained vegetables 12 to 15 minutes, scraping, until they stop releasing water and begin to colour. Stir in the tomato paste for 2 minutes until it darkens to brick, then add the soaked porcini.

Step 3

Reduce the Barolo, then set the braise. Pour in the strained wine and hold it at a strong open simmer until it has gone down by a third, 12 to 18 minutes: unreduced, its acid and tannin finish sharp and metallic. Return the beef with the porcini water and add stock only until the liquid reaches two thirds up the piece, since a submerged roast boils and tastes washed out. Cover tightly and move it to an oven at 300 degrees F (150 degrees C).

Step 4

Cook low and test with a fork. Give it 3 to 3 1/2 hours, turning once halfway, and never let the liquid do more than tremble: at a true simmer the fibres squeeze out moisture faster than the collagen converts. Held for hours above roughly 160 degrees F (70 degrees C) that collagen hydrolyses into gelatin. The fork should enter the centre and twist freely.

Step 5

Rest the piece in its own liquid, then slice. Turn the oven off, half uncover the pot and let the beef cool in the braising liquid for at least 40 minutes, or refrigerate the whole pot overnight, which is better. Remove the twine and slice half an inch thick across the grain, since along the fibres it gives stringy slices that collapse.

Step 6

Finish the sauce on gelatin alone. Strain the liquid, pressing the vegetables hard in the sieve, and skim the fat, far easier if the pot went cold overnight. Reduce gently until it coats a spoon and holds a line drawn through it, then add the remaining salt in small amounts. A chilled spoonful should set to a soft jelly.

Step 7

Cook the celeriac in almost no liquid, then mount it. Peel it deeply with a knife, removing the rough layer and woody crown, and cut cubes of three quarters of an inch. Cook them in a tightly covered pan with the milk, salt and lemon juice over the lowest heat for 25 to 30 minutes, the milk barely moving and reducing to a coating, or roast them under foil at 325 degrees F (165 degrees C). Blend hot, sieve, then beat in the cold butter a few pieces at a time.

Step 8

Sear the fresh porcini. Do not wash them: scrape the stems, wipe the caps with a barely damp cloth and slice lengthways a third of an inch thick. Heat the oil until almost smoking, lay the slices in one uncrowded layer and leave them 2 to 3 minutes until the cut face is deep gold. Turn them, add the butter, garlic and thyme, baste 2 minutes more and salt at the end.

Plating

Warm the plates to around 140 degrees F (60 degrees C): on a cold plate the gelatin rich sauce sets to a tacky film and the butter in the puree seizes.

Spoon the puree slightly off centre on a wide flat plate and pull it into an oval with the back of a warm spoon. Lay two or three slices of brasato partly across it, overlapping so the cut faces show, and spoon the sauce over the meat, keeping it off the puree: the two meet on the fork, since dark sauce dragged through pale puree muddies both.

Stand four or five porcini slices against the meat for height, tuck in a few parsley leaves, and finish with flaky salt on the beef and olive oil on the puree.

Professional Technique

The technical heart of this recipe is the celeriac puree, and specifically that celeriac is not a starchy vegetable and cannot be treated as one. A floury potato is roughly 18 to 20 percent starch and 78 percent water. Celeriac is nearer 6 or 7 percent carbohydrate, much of it not starch at all, and around 90 percent water. Boil and mash a potato and the gelatinised starch granules swell and absorb the free water, which is why potato puree holds together and thickens as it cools. Celeriac has almost nothing to do that job with, so boiled and blended it comes out a thin soup however long you blend it.

So the fix is to remove water rather than add a thickener. Cook the cubes in very little milk in a tightly covered pan over the lowest heat, so they braise in their own moisture while that liquid reduces around them, or roast them under foil, which drives off more water still. Either route concentrates the flesh before it is blended, and that is why the puree then has body. Boiling in plenty of water does the reverse and nothing afterwards saves it. Cream will not rescue a wet celeriac puree either, since more liquid in a vegetable with no starch to bind it only deepens the problem. Cold butter beaten into a concentrated hot puree works because the fat emulsifies into the pulp and supplies the structure the starch is not.

The second reason it is here is flavour: what can stand up to a Barolo reduction. That sauce is tannic, acidic and aromatically loud, and potato puree is sweet, mild and neutral, so it accepts such a sauce without offering anything back. Celeriac brings a pronounced earthy bitterness and a clear note of celery leaf, which run alongside the wine rather than under it, and that bitterness stops the reduction tasting sweet.

Texture and Moisture Control

Three things must be right in the beef. The crust comes from the sear, which needs a dry surface and a pot that stays hot, since browning wants the surface above about 300 degrees F (150 degrees C) and free water holds it at boiling point. The interior depends on the temperature of the braise, not the time: held gently, collagen converts to gelatin and the meat turns tender while staying moist, while a boil wrings out its water faster than conversion compensates.

The sauce is a gelatin emulsion and wants no help. Reduce it uncovered, stopping when it coats a spoon while still hot, since it thickens further at plating temperature and turns sticky and salty if pushed, which is why half the salt goes in only at the end.

The puree and the porcini both fail because of water: the puree by holding too much, and by cooling, since the butter emulsion breaks, so hold it warm and covered. Fresh boletus are around 90 percent water and stew in it the moment they are crowded or salted early.

Professional Mise en Place

Built across two days: the braise improves overnight, the sauce skims more easily cold, and only the porcini and the plating are last minute.

Equipment and tools

Heavy enamelled or cast iron casserole with a tight lid, just large enough for the piece
Butcher twine and a small sharp knife for trimming and tying
Fine mesh conical sieve and small ladle, for the puree and the sauce

Prepared ahead

Beef trimmed, tied and marinating, 12 to 24 hours ahead
The braise cooked and left in its liquid overnight, the set fat lifted off cold
Sauce strained and reduced up to 2 days ahead
Celeriac peeled and cubed on the day, the puree up to 4 hours ahead

Service setup

Sliced beef warming in a little sauce, covered, on low heat
Puree warm and covered, sauce hot at coating consistency and tasted for salt
Plates warmed to around 140 degrees F (60 degrees C)

Chef Tips

Use a young Nebbiolo or a simple Langhe bottling in the pot, not an aged Barolo. The tertiary aromas that make an old bottle worth drinking are the first casualties of three hours of heat, and what survives reduction is fruit, acidity and tannin, all of which a young wine has more of. Never a soft, low acid, high alcohol red.

Make the braise a day ahead as a matter of course: the flavours settle, the fat sets into a cap that lifts off whole, and the cold piece slices cleanly in a way a hot one never will.

Buy the celeriac heavy for its size and reject anything light or hollow sounding, which is drying inside and gives a stringy puree. Weigh it after peeling: a third goes to the skin and crown, where the harshest bitterness sits.

Out of season, use firm cultivated mushrooms for the garnish and more dried porcini in the braise. Never frozen ones.

Common Mistakes

Boiling the celeriac in water. The mistake that ruins the dish, and everyone makes it because it is what you do with potato. Celeriac already has too little starch and too much water. Cook it covered in very little milk, or roast it under foil.

Skipping the wine reduction. Clamping the lid on the raw marinade leaves alcohol and raw tannin in the pot for the whole cook, and the sauce finishes sharp and metallic. Reduce it uncovered by a third first.

Letting the braise simmer instead of tremble. At a real simmer the fibres force out moisture faster than collagen converts, giving meat dry and tough at once. Judge by the fork.

Thickening the sauce with flour. Three hours of chuck gives up all the gelatin the sauce needs, and added starch mutes the wine and leaves a pasty feel. Reduce instead.

Salting and crowding the porcini. Salt pulls water out and a crowded pan traps it, so the slices stew grey instead of browning. One layer, a very hot pan.

Wine Pairing

The Barolo goes into the pot, so the bottle at the table should be something else: a dry red with real acidity and firm but resolved tannin, grip for the gelatin and the butter, savour for the porcini and the earthy celeriac.

Barbaresco DOCG: The closest thing to a home match once the Barolo has gone in the pot, from the sandier hills across Alba and made from the same Nebbiolo. It opens sooner and sits softer, which is what you want beside a sauce already built on the grape. Dried rose and tar echo the reduction, and the acidity cuts the butter.

Dolcetto d'Alba DOC: The wine the Langhe actually drinks midweek, and it works better than it should. Deep coloured, low in acid and moderate in tannin, it finishes on a bitter almond twist that runs straight alongside the earthy bitterness of the celeriac. Serve it near 60 degrees F (16 degrees C).

Etna Rosso DOC: A long way from Piedmont and genuinely illuminating. Nerello Mascalese on volcanic ash gives a pale, high acid, finely tannic red that shares much of its structure with Nebbiolo but carries smoky minerality instead of tar, and that smoke picks up the seared crust.

Amarone della Valpolicella DOCG: Dry despite its dried grape origin, and the choice when you want weight against weight. Appassimento gives high alcohol, glycerol richness and dried cherry and bitter chocolate depth, with a bitter almond finish that is why it never reads sweet. Pour small measures near 64 degrees F (18 degrees C), or the alcohol buries the meat.

Storage & Reheating

This dish is better on the second day, so storage is part of the recipe. Keep the beef whole and submerged in its strained braising liquid in an airtight container, refrigerated, up to 4 days: it cannot dry out and the sauce carries on seasoning it. If already sliced, cover it with sauce, since exposed cut faces darken within hours.

The sauce alone keeps sealed 4 days, setting to a firm jelly that needs only gentle warming. The puree keeps 2 days and reheats best over a bain marie, loosened with warm milk, because direct heat splits the butter emulsion. Cooked porcini are seared to order.

Beef and sauce freeze together well up to 3 months: submerge the meat, leave headspace, thaw overnight in the refrigerator. Reheat covered at 275 degrees F (135 degrees C) for 25 to 35 minutes, or in a pan with a ladle of sauce over the lowest heat, never at a boil. Do not freeze the puree: it separates on thawing.

Nutrition

Per serving, based on 6 servings:

Calories: 690 kcal
Total Fat: 41 g
Saturated Fat: 18 g
Trans Fat: 0.8 g
Unsaturated Fat: 21 g
Cholesterol: 175 mg
Sodium: 620 mg
Total Carbohydrates: 14 g
Fiber: 3 g
Total Sugars: 5 g
Added Sugars: 0 g
Protein: 52 g
Lactose: 1.2 g
Principal micronutrients: iron, zinc, selenium, vitamin B12, niacin, potassium, phosphorus