A la Julie&Julia

While my B was in Manila some weeks ago, I received a text message from him asking what would I like as a pasalubong. I told him to just buy me anything, and he said there is nothing called anything anywhere in the mall so I told him to buy me a movie that he thinks I would like. So he came home and my pasalubong was a DVD of the Julie and Julia movie.

I enjoyed it although I found it dragging in some parts but still I was impressed with the premise of cooking a whole cookbook and blogging about it. One recipe that stuck to me after I finished watching the movie was the beouf bourguignon. It's probably because I was fascinated with the name. It sounds to me like a procedure that people at the salons do to your hair. :) So after the movie, I googled Julia Child, read up on her, then googled the beef recipe and studied at least four versions of it. I thought it would be something interesting to do so I saved the webpage and promised myself that I'll sacrifice a week budget when my stipend comes, and try it in my kitchen.

So today I did, and it was soooo yummy... of course I do not know if it is supposed to taste like the way mine does cuz I never had any beef burgundy in my life. I mostly followed Ina Garten's recipe because it is the most comprehensive and very easy to follow. I of course was not able to find some of the ingredients such as bacon (yes, no bacon in the whole Nueva Vizcaya today), pearl onions, thyme (I ran out of budget money:), parsley and cognac. I invested on a nice dry red wine because it seems to be the ingredient that would define the beef. I also used canned mushroom instead of fresh. I also let it simmer on my stove instead of in the oven as I do not have an oven-safe pot, and I'm saving gas. :-) hehe

I started preparing it at 1PM and was able to eat a late lunch by 4pm. The meat was still a bit rubbery so I left it simmering on the stove until now. Two more hours and Bong and Sarah and I can feast on it.

There are several suggested ways to serve it, like with a garlic bread, dry toast, or pasta. But of course I am serving it with rice.

We'll see if my judges will like it.