Red Wine Beef fail (and then for the win!)

This recipe was a culinary adventure. Let me start from the beginning. I have been saving up my Coke reward points for quite some time (one 20 oz. bottle at a time!) and finally had enough for a subscription to Everyday Food. My first issue arrived a week ago and I found the best section ever: Cheap Cuts Made Great. That's right, cheap cuts of meat turned delicious. I originally wanted to do apple-braised turkey thighs (and one day I will!) but I couldn't find turkey thighs at the store. So I did recipe number two: red wine braised beef brisket. I have a bottle of red wine that I keep for cooking purposes so this recipe seemed perfect. I bought most of the ingredients (subbing an onion for the shallots as shallots are expensive) but when it came time for the actual execution, I had the "bright" idea of using my 3-in-1 rice cooker/steamer/crock pot. I mean, it's good as a rice cooker, good as a steamer...I wanted to try out its crock pot functions. So I modified the recipe using the instruction manual/recipe book that came with the device (the recipe was beef in red wine with onions). Get ready for a failure...then a win!

Here's the ingredients, I used beef brisket as that was my original recipe intention. I also had some leftover carrots that I threw in (and eventually some leftover frozen peas). My mom used to always to do this, sort of follow a recipe and then just start adding things. It used to drive me nuts. And now I find myself doing it...must be genetic.

So for veggies, I used one rather large onion (HyVee apparently only sells gigantic (or as I named it, Gigantore!!!!) onions), three carrots and about nine cloves of garlic.

I trimmed my 2 1/2 pound chunk of beef brisket of excess fat and cut it into big ol' meaty chunks.


I took a picture of this gorgeous example of wine opening. I didn't know how to a "waiter-style" corkscrew before and my first attempt resulted in me using a butter knife to slowly carve the cork out. I looked it up on youtube, and viola! My subsequent attempts make me look cultured.

Back to the actual cooking, meat chunks get browned. And that pan is way overcrowded (which violates rule number one of properly browned meat: don't over crowd the pan). I was just too lazy to split it into two batches.

Improperly browned meat.

I put the meat into the crock pot and then cooked the veggies in the beef pan remnants. The smell...as the Kool-Aid man says, "Oh yeah!"

In goes the wine, it made everything look rather purple. Like I was cooking with grape Kool-Aid (Oh yeah!).

The instruction/recipe booklet told me to bring it to boiling and then put it into the crock pot. This turned out to be a mistake, I will explain later.

I left it in the crock pot for seven hours, adding frozen peas in the last ten minutes. This is what I got. It kind of looked the same, a little less purple, but not that great.

Close-up of the questionable beef.

Verdict? It was a fail. And by fail, I mean it was not very tender chunks of beef in wine. Not wine sauce, straight up wine. I took a bite and exclaimed in a Borat voice (not sure why it came out this way), "Very boozy!" I was sorely disappointed.


But wait! There's more! I blamed my failure on my crock pot/steamer/rice cooker. Two out of three ain't bad, but I wanted to salvage my beef. So I stuck it all back on the stove and boiled off all that alcohol. I simmered it for about 15 minutes and added a couple tablespoons of flour to thicken the gravy. Then I put a lid on it and stuck it in a 350 degree oven for about an hour. Result? For the win, my beef was saved!

And it was pretty darn delicious and that meat was tender. Like a glorified beef stew. And man, that red wine gravy was delicious!


I give you the recipe from Everyday Food, not the horrible idea from the instruction manual.

Red Wine Braised Beef Brisket

2 tablespoons plus 2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
3 1/2 pounds beef brisket, cut into 3-inch pieces
salt and pepper
8 shallots, halved
6 garlic cloves, smashed and peeled
3 cups dry red wine (in a crock pot, you'd use less as liquids don't evaporate as much)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large Dutch oven or heavy pot, heat 2 tablespoons oil over medium-high. Season brisket with salt and pepper; in batches cook, turning occasionally, until dark brown on all sides, about 20 minutes total. Transfer brisket to a plate and discard fat from pot. Return pot to heat and add 2 teaspoons oil and shallots; cook, stirring, until shallots are browned, 3 minutes. Add garlic and cook, stirring, until fragrant, 1 minute.

Add wine and simmer rapidly until reduced by three-fourths, about 15 minutes. Return beef to pot and add just enough water to cover meat (5 to 6 cups). Bring to a boil, cover, then place pot in oven. Cook until beef is tender, 3 1/2 to 4 hours.