JULIE & JULIA & JEFF - A Florida Foodie's Tribute to Francochef Julia Child
by Jeff Corydon
My daughter Lee and granddaughter recently spent two weeks chez nous, coming from their faraway roost in the Indian ocean island-state of Mauritius. A main purpose of the visit was to vet a few Florida college campuses where 17-year-old Camille might wind up pursuing university studies next fall. This done, they had a brief spell left to loaf with us in Tampa before their Friday departure.
On the Monday evening before D-Day, we took in the much touted film "Julie & Julia," about late, great queen of French cuisine Julia Child and her devoted fan Julie Powell. The latter had vowed, folks who saw the movie will recall, to serve up every recipe in Julia's classic French cookbook within a year, chronicling daily progress in her blog.
Like Julie, I greatly admired Julia Child--and had used her recipes for entertaining during years abroad in State Department's Foreign Service. I couldn't help being emotionally stirred by Hollywood's version of her evolution as a French chef, and Julie's busy year preparing her idol's menus as a self-imposed challenge.
After all, Julia had acquired French cooking expertise during her diplomat husband's postings in Paris and Marseilles, even as I was serving in Vietnam, Morocco and Tunisia, former territories of France, and, like her, developing a lust for Gallic fare.
So, setting the dinner table with French flavor zapped me as an ideal way to celebrate Lee's and Camille's impending sendoff to Mauritius. They, too, were both into French cooking. My daughter had married a French-Mauritian met in 1982 when visiting my wife and me in Mauritius, where I was American consul. And hadn't tiny Mauritius been a French colony for over a century before France lost it to Great Britain after the Napoleonic War? All stars seemed aligned to predestine such a banquet, meant to make their visit all the more memorable.
I found myself on Tuesday morning rummaging through my foodie files in hope of locating the right recipe for this project. The one I eventually turned up was perfect-- a yellowed Washington Post clipping of a Julia Child column from 1971 giving her classic recipe for what the headline called "Good old boeuf stew."
Of course, I realized this would be my challenge. While Boeuf Bourguignon, or Beef Burgundy, was among Julia's signature dishes, I'd never prepared it precisely as she directed. Besides, the movie had highlighted the disaster of Julie's first effort to execute this recipe of Julia Child's. After hours of prepping necessary ingredients, she was so weary she fell asleep at oven-side. When she awoke, she found her concoction cooked to a crisp--Beef Burned-gundy, so to speak. Still, I was determined to triumph where Julie had failed.
By Tuesday afternoon I was out buying a two-pound top-sirloin roast,a pound of thick-sliced bacon, beef broth, pearl onions and two bottles of 2002 Santenay red Burgundy. Once home, I spent a couple of hours trimming the sirloin of fat and gristle, cutting the meat into 1-1/2-inch cubes, and slicing 1 x 1/4-inch strips of bacon to approximate lardons French chefs use making sauces. As Julia recommended, I also put the sirloin scraps to simmering in water and spices that would add zest to my gravy.
On Wednesday I shopped again for other ingredients-- new potatoes, fresh mushrooms, tomatoes, carrots, celery, and garlic. Then back to the kitchen for chopping, slicing, peeling and other grooming of these vegetables. I also floured and browned the beef chunks in olive oil before leaving them simmering slowly in our Dutch oven with two cups each of broth and wine, tomato chunks and an herb and spice bouquet. In a bit over two hours the beef at last reached the softness I was after.
Lee, Camille and my wife were by now as excited as I about my project. When taking it on, I hadn't realized what gigantic efforts making Beef Burgundy from scratch entailed. Well, chapeau to Master Chef Julia for always managing to smile as she labored in her kitchen. I'd simply have to work longer and harder than ever before to create tomorrow's farewell dinner for four, I mused. So far it had been anything but "Child's" play-- an ironic thought which re-energized me for what I still had to do.
Final cooking and composing of my "boeuf stew" started at noon Thursday and took all afternoon. Further tasks included processing and cooking onions, carrots, and mushrooms, all separately, before stirring them in with the previously cooked beef and blessing the pot with touches of lemon juice and fine French cognac. Oh, yes, and boiling and peeling the potatoes-- a customary side dish--plus assembling the traditional accompanying salad verte with vinaigrette. After testing the sauce for strength and seasoning, and adding more splashes of broth and wine, I thought my masterpiece was ready for the taste test.
Suspense peaked as we gathered around the table. To my delight, lifting the Dutch oven's cover liberated a sensuous aroma that put everyone at ease. Before long we were digging in with passion-- most thankful that Julia Child had been so at home in her Cambridge kitchen, and willing to educate average Americans like me to feel at home on the range in French.
Lee and Camille offered warm compliments for the feast, convincing me they would long remember this special evening. So many pieces, from our personal pasts to a touted film production, and from Julia's inspiration to my dogged faith in her teaching, had combined to carry the day. This tribute to daughter and granddaughter, and to Julia Child's legacy, was a success!
Having no blog to report to, I filed this tale away in Memory Lane, ready for sharing as the future might allow. Alors, bon appetit!
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