I haven’t got any beautiful food to share with you today, but I do have some delicious dishes to write about. I’m not in synch with the French Fridays crowd this week; they’re all writing about their adventures in Garbure. Kevin and I are eating vegetarian this weekend, so the luxurious-sounding bean, duck, and sausage stew will have to wait. Instead, I’m doing a catch up for a couple of recipes I missed about a month ago.
First, bœuf à la ficelle, or in my case, la viande d’orignal à la ficelle. I used moose tenderloin in place of beef. This recipe uses a technique that many of us were skeptical about – poach an expensive cut of meat in beef broth? Madness! In fact, it’s quite the opposite. The gentle bath of beef broth makes the tenderloin perfectly seasoned and perfectly medium-rare. I cheated, opting not to make the oxtail stock, instead infusing beef broth with the aromatics called for in Dorie’s recipe. I think this is a fair trade off, as long as you use a good brand of stock. The moose tenderloins I used were much smaller than beef tenderloin, which surprised me. I only poached them for about seven or eight minutes to get them to rare. Covered with foil, they cooked a little more and were nicely medium-rare when I served them.
I served the moose and vegetables with this Garlic and Fennel Purée from Food and Wine. The garlic and fennel flavour was wonderful, but I prefer a heartier purée, like Dorie’s celery root purée. I think I’d rather use that recipe as a template for fennel purée, but keep the mountain of garlic from Food and Wine‘s version.
Even though I loved the dish, I think the best part of this recipe is the left-over broth. I left it with my mother, who first poached some chicken in it, and then the next day, warmed up some ham. I can’t imagine how much more flavour she’d infused in the broth by the time she used the last of it in a pot of soup. That broth is secret ingredient material.
Unfortunately, my presentation doesn’t do the dish justice. I need a food styling tutor, I think.
You can find Dorie’s recipe for Bœuf à la Ficelle here.
You can read about the rest of the Doristas’ experiences with this dish here.
For dessert, there was Paris-Brest, filled with a vanilla and candied almond pastry cream, along with cream puffs filled with leftover Meyer lemon curd from last week’s crêpes. I only wish our assignment had been cream puffs, because those turned out beautifully. Unfortunately, I didn’t pipe the dough for the Paris-Brest into wide enough rings, so it’s not as impressive as it’s intended to be. I also managed to break the top when I was assembling it, so that added to the imperfection. No matter, because it was delicious. Definitely worth brushing up on my pastry piping skills.
To see how the rest of the French Fridays Crew fared with Paris-Brest, head here: Paris-Brest
I’ll be making both these recipes again, even if my presentation skills don’t show them to their best advantage. They may be homely versions of elegant dishes, but that’s easily forgotten once the eating begins.
One Wet Foot 
Glad you enjoyed both of these, Teresa. I tucked that broth in my freezer…can’t wait to use if!
Thanks, Liz! I’m looking forward to trying some of the soup my Mom made with it!
I’m quite intrigued by your moose tenderloins. i’ve eaten elk in every form but never moose. A great idea to cook it with the Beef a la Ficelle recipe. I loved Dorie’s celery root puree recipe – your Post reminded me to make it again before it gets too warm here in California. The Paris-Brest was delicious, wasn’t it? My top broke also but I just sprinkled powered sugar on it. Teresa, powered sugar covers up anything and everything! Nicely done.
Thanks, Mary! I realized too late that I’d forgotten the powdered sugar.
I love moose, but elk is my absolute favourite game meat.I used an elk steak for the Bistrot Paul Bert steak and I’m still dreaming of it.
looking good! And what is a little oxtail when you have a moose waiting in the wings? Sounds like a fair trade to me.
Thanks, Trevor! It was definitely a fair trade.
The reason the Moose Tenderloin seemed small was it wasn’t the whole tenderloin, Dad only got 1/4 of it, there were 4 packages and from the butcher and the head piece ended up in my freezer!
Let me know when you want some plate “tutoring”, I might be able to help a bit lol.
Okay – I get it, now! I was perplexed.
I’d love to do a plating workshop with you! We have to get it together to do a post together.
We all had a few issues with the Paris Brest but yours looks delicious anyway! And moose à la ficelle? Wow!
The moose was really good in this dish. I’m also glad I’m not the only one who didn’t ace the Paris-Brest.
Teresa I had the same issues with the Paris Brest. I will be trying again this weekend as my daughter in law will be here and wants to try it. I think I might make individual ones this time! I haven’t made the beef on a string yet. Another catch up for me! I’ve never tried moose and wonder if it’s similar to deer. Good job on catch up posts. When I read yesterday that we will finish the book in April of next year I thought I’d better get busy catching up!
I gave up on any pretense of food styling a while back and accepted the fact that my contributions to the FFwD world will be “what dinner really looks like in my house” style. As much as I enjoy drooling over the food porn which some of our more talented fellow bloggers are able to capture, I also like the real ones. I think they show a bit more personality.
Moose tenderloins is a fascinating idea! I don’t think we would get moose here, but I love the exoticness of it. I struggle to make mains pretty too. And your Paris Brest – perfection.
I have yet to make either of these dishes, but I am looking forward to both!