Elegant Beef Wellington
(April, 14 2002)
Ingredients
1 4 to 4 1/2 lb beef fillet (or beef sirloin)*
salt and pepper to taste
butter Pastry
duxelles
1 egg
sesame seed
Preparation
Place beef on rack in a shallow baking pan and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Roast at 425 degrees for 30 min.
Let stand until cool, then trim off all fat. Roll Butter Pastry on a floured surface to rectangle about 3 inches longer than roast and 12 to 14 inches wide.
Press ducelles into pastry, leaving and inch uncovered on all edges. Place beef on pastry.
Moisten pastry edges and enclose beef, pressing edges together firmly. Trim off excess pastry from ends so single layer covers ends of roast. Place roll, seam side down, in a shallow baking pan. Cut decorations from pastry trimmings and place on top. Brush pastry with egg beaten with 1 T water and sprinkle with sesame seed.
Bake at 400 degrees for 30 to 35 minutes or until browned. Let stand for 15 to 20 minutes before slicing.
Butter Pastry
3 3/4 cup sifted flour
1 tsp salt
1 Cup cold butter
2 T shortening
3/4 Cup (about) ice water
Preparation
Combine flour and salt in a bowl and cut in butter and shortening until particles are fine. Add water, 1 T at a time, to make a stiff dough. Cover and chill.
Duxelles
1 lb mushrooms, finely chopped
1/4 cup chopped green onion
1/4 cup butter
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp Marjoram
2 tsp flour
dash pepper
1/4 cup beef broth
2 T chopped parsley
1/4 cup finely chopped cooked ham
Preparation
Sauté the mushrooms and the onion in butter in a sauce pan until liquid evaporates. Stir in salt, marjoram, four, pepper and broth. Cook, stirring constantly, until mixture comes to a boil and thickens. Remove from heat and stir in parsley and ham. Cool.
Tomatoes with Horseradish Cream
8 small tomatoes
1/2 cup whipping cream
1 T horseradish
1/2 tsp Dijon Mustard
dash salt
Preparation
Cut tops from tomatoes and hollow out slightly, scooping out seeds. Drain upside down. Whip the cream until stiff and fold in horseradish, mustard and salt. Fill tomatoes with cream mixture just before serving. Serve around Beef Wellington.
* In an effort to save money we tried using a simple 4 1/2 pound roast ($8.00) instead of fillet or sirloin ($30.00 - $40.00). This was a big mistake, although the flavor was very good, the meat was way to tough. Kinda figured that was going to happen though, so we weren't too surprised (we used up the rest of the meat later in the week by slicing it very thin and using it for sandwiches, and serving it with instant Béarnaise sauce :) ). Since it did taste so good we are going to give this a shot again next week, but this time we will use steaks wrapped individually in the pastry and duxelles.
Here's a preview of next week's recipe, Elegant Kitten Wellington
