How to Make Classic Beef Wellington this Christmas
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Beef wellington is the ultimate Christmas roast. It's a little bit tricky to make so focus on what you're doing and take it slow if it's your first time.
Features of a Wellington
Beef Tenderloin
Beef wellington is made with the most desirable cut of beef on a cow, the tenderloin. It's located towards the rear of the back of the cow sandwiched between the sirloin and the top sirloin. The tenderloin is incredibly tender and buttery because it hardly gets any work. It doesn't have very much marbling and therefore, doesn't have quite as much flavor as a fattier cut.
The beef has to be seared in hot oil before wrapping and baking for a couple of reasons. First off for flavor; the Maillard reaction (a reaction between amino acids and reducing sugars in meat) is responsible for browning the beef which gives an excellent flavor. The seared outside also helps the beef retain a lot of its moisture.
Duxelles
A duxelles is a preparation of mushrooms sautéed with onions, shallots, garlic, and herbs used to make stuffings or sauces. Use mushrooms with a very strong flavor like portobello or shitake. Don't be afraid to use a nice mixture of mushrooms either. Morel and chanterelle mushrooms have a very unique flavor.
Make a duxelles by pulsing mushrooms in a food processor with salt, fresh garlic, and fresh thyme leaves until very finely chopped. Empty the mushroom mixture into a non-stick frying pan and place over medium heat to evaporate off the water. This is a very important step to prevent the pastry from getting soggy after baking and to intensify that mushroom flavor.
Parma Ham
Prosciutto di Parma is a thinly sliced, Italian, dry-cured ham that has a nutty and salty flavor. Real parma ham is expensive (up to $80 per kilo) because it's very artisan and like any artisan product, takes more time and care than any generic produce. The process of making prosciutto can take from nine months to two years, depending on the size of the ham.
Puff Pastry
Puff pastry is all about the butter. The better the butter, the richer, flakier, and tastier the pastry. The characteristics of 'good butter' are texture, flavor, aroma, and moisture content. European butter has a high-fat content which is what you want for pastry.
Grade AA, Grade A and Grade B which is hard to find outside of industrial settings. Grade AA signifies that the butter is made from sweet cream, is sweet smelling and tasting, and has a smooth consistency. Grade A is still good, made from sweet cream, though it’s not quite as good in terms of its texture which can be slightly grainy. Grade B is still considered “acceptable” though it may have a lightly acidic flavor as a result of being made from slightly spoiled milk (note that an acid flavor is considered an asset where Euro-style butters are concerned, but American Grade B butters are very different from an overall texture and flavor standpoint).
When you can afford it it's all fun and dandy to pay $20 for a pound of butter but frankly, price is not always an indicator. Good butter comes from good cream which comes from healthy, happy cows. It's common sense that a cow that has a range to graze and isn't getting its biological processes altered by grain will produce better butter than anything regardless of price.
How to Make a Beef Wellington
First, season the beef with salt and pepper and sear it on each side for flavor and moisture retention, and set aside to rest.
Lay a layer of cling film onto your counter and even lay a couple of pieces of parma ham onto the cling film. How many you use depends on how big your fillets are.
Use a spoon or rubber spatula to distribute the evaporated duxelles over the parma ham then lay the beef fillet onto the middle. Take the side cling film closest to you and roll the beef in the ham tightly. Grab either side of the cling film and twist in opposite directions to tighten followed by a rest in the fridge while you prepare your pastry.
Roll out the pastry according to the size of your wellingtons and lay on a clean piece of cling film. Brush the rim of the pastry with egg wash to help them stick together.
Remove the meat from the fridge, unwrap, and lay in the middle of the pastry rectangle. Repeat the rolling step with the pastry (roll and tighten by twisting the opposing sides) and rest in the fridge for an hour.
Preheat the oven to 400°F. Brush the pastry with egg, score the skin with a sharp knife, and sprinkle with flaky sea salt (how long does sea salt last?). Lay the wellingtons onto a baking tray lined with parchment and bake for 20 minutes or until the pastry has puffed and brown nicely. Rest the wellington for 10 minutes before carving.
Classic Beef Wellington
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 pounds portobello or shitake mushrooms
- 2 shallots, chopped
- 4 cloves garlic, chopped
- 2 sprigs fresh thyme leaves
- salt
- 1 pound center cut beef tenderloin, room temperature
- flaky sea salt
- ground black pepper
- 1 tbsp grapeseed oil
- 1/2 pound sheet puff pastry
- 2 eggs
Instructions
- Make a duxelles by pulsing mushrooms in a food processor with salt, fresh garlic, and fresh thyme leaves until very finely chopped.
- Empty the mushroom mixture into a non-stick frying pan and place over medium heat to evaporate off the water.
- First, season the beef with salt and pepper and sear it on each side for flavor and moisture retention, and set aside to rest.
- Lay a layer of cling film onto your counter and even lay a couple of pieces of parma ham onto the cling film. How many you use depends on how big your fillets are.
- Use a spoon or rubber spatula to distribute the evaporated duxelles over the parma ham then lay the beef fillet onto the middle.
- Take the side cling film closest to you and roll the beef in the ham tightly.
- Grab either side of the cling film and twist in opposite directions to tighten followed by a rest in the fridge while you prepare your pastry.
- Roll out the pastry according to the size of your wellingtons and lay on a clean piece of cling film. Brush the rim of the pastry with egg wash to help them stick together.
- Remove the meat from the fridge, unwrap, and lay in the middle of the pastry rectangle. Repeat the rolling step with the pastry (roll and tighten by twisting the opposing sides) and rest in the fridge for an hour.
- Preheat the oven to 400°F. Brush the pastry with egg, score the skin with a sharp knife, and sprinkle with flaky sea salt. Lay the wellingtons onto a baking tray lined with parchment and bake for 20 minutes or until the pastry has puffed and brown nicely. Rest the wellington for 10 minutes before carving.
Nutrition Facts
Calories
295Fat
21Sat. Fat
7Carbs
14Fiber
1Net carbs
13Sugar
2Protein
13Sodium
134Cholesterol
64
