Even though having common gastronomic roots with pastissada from Venice pašticada today is a gastronomical heritage of Dalmatia and Croatia. Beef in a rich sauce made of vegetables, dried fruit and wine, served with gnocchi, is a constituent part of a ceremonious Dalmatian table, where always a discussion will be led whose pašticada is the best and the most real. 🙂
This pašticada recipe was given to us by the courtesy of Damira S.
Ingredients
1 kg (2.20 lb) beef (cuts or rump)
For marinade:
250 ml (8.5 fl oz) red wine
100 ml (3.4 fl oz) wine vinegar
1 tablespoon aceto balsamico
4 bay leaves
1 sprig sage
1 sprig rosemary
For pricking the beef:
80 g (2.8 oz) smoked pancetta
1 teaspoon cut rosemary needles
¼ teaspoon coriander powder
1 carrot (60 g/2 oz)
3-4 cloves of garlic
1 sprig rosemary
For sauce:
1 onion
1 smaller leek (200 g/7 oz)
¼ celery root (120 g/4.2 oz)
2 carrots (120 g/4.2 oz)
1 smaller kohlrabi
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lard
1 tablespoon tomato concentrate
1 tablespoon salt
¼ teaspoon grated nutmeg
¼ teaspoon coriander powder
3 cloves
2 bay leaves
4 leaves of sage
½ of smaller lemon
4-6 pieces of prunes
50 ml (1.7 fl oz) prošek (Dalmatian dessert wine)
40 g (1.4 oz) edible corn starch
Preparation
Remove the membranes from the meat, wash it and dry it. Place it in a deeper dish. Stir the wine vinegar and aceto balsamico, and then cover the meat with this mixture. Then add bay leaves, sage and rosemary. Cover the dish and let the meat marinate over night. During marinating turn the meat a couple of times.
Clean and cut the vegetables for the sauce on smaller pieces. Cut pancetta on thin sticks that are 2-3 cm long. Season with rosemary and coriander and stir slightly. Cut the cleaned carrots and garlic also on sticks.
Remove the meat from marinade and dry it. Using a thin knife make holes in the meat and successively insert bacon, carrots, garlic and rosemary needles into the holes.
Put olive oil and lard in a deep wide dish. (If there is some pancetta left from stuffing, add it to the oil for the preparation of the sauce). When they are heated, fry the meat on all sides. Remove it on a plate, and on that same oil briefly bake cut vegetables, adding tomato concentrate. Return the meat into the dish, add salt and half of the marinade. The add seasonings: nutmeg, coriander, cloves, sage, bay leaves and lemon. Pour enough water to cover the meat and it cook on slow fire for about 2-2.5 hours in a semicovered dish.
Meat is done when the fork easily falls through the meat. In the meantime, strain the vegetable sauce through a thick strainer. Move the sauce in a wide dish. Add cut prunes and prošek. Cook the sauce on slow fire for 10-15 minutes. This is the time to provide the sauce with its final flavour, saltiness and thickness. Near the end of cooking make it thick with edible corn starch which you previously diluted in smaller quantity of sauce.
After the meat is cooled for a while, cut it on steaks 1 cm thick. Return them into the sauce, chop the remains and use them to enrich the sauce additionally.
Serving
Pour the sauce over the meat and serve with cooked gnocchi.
Preparation time
3.5 hours + time to marinate the meat
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