Red Wine Fed Beef Ribeye...Yes Please!

Just a little look at Oliver BC's very own red wine fed beef. This is a rib eye steak, the cattle are black angus, the marbling, texture and flavor are some of the best that I have ever seen. This is not the Sezmu that has become synonymous with red wine beef but it is finished in the same place by the same man. His cattle are marketed under the name of Okanagan's Finest. I'm sure Mr. ODS will fill you all in on the details in the near future.


This is not quite the same glory cut as the rib eye but the marbling on this bottom round is quite spectacular as well.


Not the greatest photo but this is some salt cured beef liver from the red wine fed beef. I, like most people, are thinking that the liver would be the place with the most flavor benefit. I found it to have a much more subtle flavor, not as much of the iron flavor that can be too strong in a beef liver. Great stuff.


Yes, we do try to use all the cuts of this cattle. We see know reason why any piece should not be used. Here are three tongues that were brined and then later on braised. We can then use them for sandwiches or a potato and tongue hash or blah blah blah. The tongue seems to be one of the things that makes people squeemish but it's really quite fantastic.

Lunch feature 23.09.10

Red Wine Fed Beef Stew
Tiger Blue Cheese & Salt Cured Beef Liver Dauphine Potatoes
Creme Fraiche

So, this is my second go at running Oliver BC raised wine fed beef as a lunch special. As you may recall, I was not totally please with my performance on the previous attempt. This time was much better.

Now, I must admit that braising a bottom round in a stew is probably not the best way to showcase the beauty of this beef but, in my defense, it was chili outside and a bottom round is a bottom round. I didn't really feel like a shaved beef sandwich applied to the weather outside. With that being said, the flavor and texture of the meat was still outstanding.

I started by searing the cubes of beef and then set them aside until I was ready to add them back into the braise. Then I added my mirepoix(carrots, celery, onion) and sauteed all that in some of Stanley's oh so precious tallow. I added my flour and cooked it to a medium roux. Then I added pureed tomatoes, red wine and beef stock plus a few herbs and such. I let this slowly braise and thicken for about five hours, stirring fastidiously to ensure that the flour never got a chance to burn to the bottom of the pot. Cooking the flour flavor out of a roux thickened braise is extremely important and takes some time and patience to master. Nothing is more disappointing than a sauce that tastes of flour. While all this was going on, I cut up some more mirepoix and sauteed all that off so that I could add that to the stew before serving. The second thing that can ruin a stew is over cooked, flavorless vegetables. The way I avoid this is to strain the stew once the meat is cooked properly. I then pick out all the beef and return it to the braising liquid and discard all the cooked vegetables. The real secret to a good stew is to let it cool down first then reheat it later on when you need it. You know how everyone says that stew and chili is better the second day, well, that's because the meat reabsorbs the liquid during the cooling that it has lost during the braise, making it more tender and tasty. Once I was ready to reheat the stew when an order came in I added the vegetables that I had sauteed of earlier. Perfect stew every time.

Every stew needs a garnish, usually potatoes. I couldn't just put potatoes in this stew, I needed to do something that would keep the goblins asleep. I still wanted to put potatoes in there somehow and I also wanted a blue cheese component as well. Something crispy is always nice, how about dauphine potatoes, yes that would suffice I believe, in keeping those goblins in a deep fryer induced coma for at least 12 hours. Dauphine potatoes are one of, in my opinion, Frances greatest gifts to the culinary world.

Potatoes mixed in about equal parts with choux pastry. Choux pastry which is used to make profiteroles and other delicious pastry, both savory and sweet, is a paste made of milk, butter, eggs and flour, and is of course horribly fatty. So, I mixed the potatoes, choux pastry, blue cheese & salt cured red wine fed beef liver

together into a glory paste and deep fried three of those little ditty's to sit in the stew. The blue cheese was a nice addition but the liver really brought the stew to life. I then finished it all off with a dollop of creme fraiche.

Gotta love those cool autumn days. This feature flew out the doors, it seems like a lot of people were of the same mind as me on this day. Oh, and thanks Bill for all your beautiful local beef. What a joy.

Sean Peltier

Lunch feature 17.09.10

Grilled red wine beef skirt steak
foraged mushroom bread pudding
local pear puree
beans with hazelnut vinaigrette

Not every day in a kitchen is a great one, actually far from it. Sometimes extenuating circumstances, such as a motorcycle crash that leaves you with a whole body that aches and throbs with every movement, can really put a damper on an otherwise good day. Today was one of those days.

I finally got the chance to cook with some of Oliver BC's very own red wine beef. Sezmu is the name that is becoming synonymous with red wine beef here in the Okanagan. However, there is another name as well. Okanagan's Finest is also doing red wine fed beef. What is the difference? None really. There will be more on that to come in the next few days as some people who know more about the in's and out's of the operation get to posting on this blog.

As I was saying, today was one of those days. I just wasn't feeling it, I was lacking my mojo if you will. The feature was all there in the flavor components. The skirt steak was by far the most tender skirt steak I have ever had. I did no marinade on it, just salt and pepper before it hit the grill and it was almost melting in my mouth. The flavor was outstanding, usually a skirt steak or flank steak has a great flavor to begin with, but this was something special. As for the rest of the dish, I did a bread pudding with the mushrooms that Shannon and I foraged near Falkland plus the addition of some Chantrelles. I did a pear puree with local pears, pear vinegar and butter. I also did a warm bean salad with a hazelnut vinaigrette to bring everything together.

I wasn't overly happy with the plating of the dish, thankfully the red wine beef was so damn good it spoke for itself and took everything else on the plate along for the ride. Right now in the cooler we have all sorts of offal, rib roasts, top rounds, skirt steaks, short ribs and a few other cuts that I'm forgetting. Pictures and commentary will follow shortly.

Sean Peltier