One-Pot Daube

The daube red-wine marinade, to be prepared the night before and left in the fridge.

For brisket or short ribs that drip from the knife

Gushing over brisket is something I can only do in hindsight. Growing up in New England, I’m used to that classic Jewish-American rub calling for vinegar, brown sugar and ketchup—ironically, a home-made industrial braising sauce. It wasn’t necessarily bad, the same way that mac’n’cheese or pancakes from a box are absolutely fine. But it wasn’t great, either. Moving to the south of France finally changed that.

In Marseille, we daube (and yes, it’s a noun and a verb): a traditional way of marinading meat and then braising it for hours in a warm Dutch oven. The meat is first left to soak overnight in a whole bottle of red wine, and a mix of ingredients and spices that evoke winter in Provence: a bit of sweetness from the peel of an orange, bay leaves for bitterness and sometimes salty olives or even the brine. The next day, the meat is browned in olive oil and cooked together with the marinade and winter vegetables. It’s not a bourgignon which, coming from Paris and the north, calls for even heartier cold-weather ingredients like mushrooms and fried lard.

Daube is one of my favorites because it’s just easy and fun: the French throw in what they have and what they like. If I don’t want too much sweetness with my meat, for example, I take the zest of a grapefruit instead of using an orange peel. I put in the stalks from my fennel if they’re lying around the fridge since there’s not much other use for them. And about the wine: some will say it needs to be a good bottle, I say it needs to be just vaguely drinkable. The alcohol is going to break down and transform over the next day with oxygen and heat into something that’s like wine, anyway.

The mix of wine and citrus peel is a classy nod to the flavor of the sugar, ketchup and vinegar mix I grew up with; the overnight marinade and all-day braise keeps the meat juicy and soft. The sauce, thick and rich in peppercorn, herbs, velvety onions and jam-like garlic cloves still en chemise, is a more daring take that marries easy French cooking with a traditional Ashkenazi recipe. I usually braise the brisket with carrots and potatoes, which absorb all of the fat and aromatics stuffed into the Dutch oven.

Important: the brisket itself can be substituted with short ribs. This classic Kosher cut is cheaper, fattier and so much easier to brown (the brisket flip is a sport in itself). There is no sacrifice here. I first had the idea to use short ribs when towards Hanukkah of this year, it was impossible to find a butcher who had a brisket cut in Marseille: improvise with what you’ve got locally. I found that the short ribs melted from the fat and bone almost like a confit and that the bones added a ton of flavor.

And pair your brisket or short rib daube with a red wine—this time, a drinkable one.

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Serving: 6 people

Ingredients:

For the marinade (prepare one day ahead)—
Brisket (6 lbs / 2,7kg) or short ribs (5 lbs / 2,3kg cut crosswise into 2 in pieces)
1 bottle of cheap red wine
Grapefruit or orange peel
Black peppercorn
Star anis or 2 1/2 tsp anis seeds
Fresh fennel stalks or 2 1/2 tsp fennel seeds
4 yellow onions, quartered

For the braise—
Kosher salt
Ground black pepper
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp tomato paste
3 tbsp. all-purpose flour
2 large leeks, chopped
6 carrots, peeled and chopped
8 small potatoes, unpeeled and chopped length-wise
2 whole garlic heads, unpeeled, halved crosswise
Herb mix: 2 bay leaves (fresh or dried) with thyme and/or rosemary

For serving—
Chopped parsley

Preparation:

1. The night before serving, put your meat into a large metal bowl and top it up with a whole cheap bottle of red wine. Add your onions, citrus peel or zest, and spice mix. Let the marinade sit in the refrigerator overnight uncovered.

2. The next day, preheat the oven to 300F. Remove the meat from the marinade and salt and pepper it on both sides. Heat your Dutch oven on the stove top at medium-high with olive oil and then start browning the brisket until it’s well browned one side, then flip it in one, quick movement and brown the other side. If using short ribs, brown them on all sides. Remove it from the Dutch oven and put it to the side for now.

3. If there is more than a thin layer of fat that’s rendered on the bottom of the Dutch oven, pour out the extra and save it for another dish. Add your potatoes, cut-side down, and let them cook in the beef fat until golden. Remove them and add the leeks, cook until soft. Add the carrots, tomato paste, flour and a few tablespoons of the wine marinade. Mix until the vegetables are coated in a thick sauce, and then remove them from the Dutch oven. Put the meat back in, cover it with the marinade and place all of your other ingredients on top.

4. Cover the Dutch oven with the lid (if it’s a tight fit, don’t worry—the meat will shrink) and put it in the real oven. Leave it for at least four hours, untouched. Add salt and pepper to taste and keep on a low heat (no higher than 175F) until serving. Skim fat off top if you like (I usually skim off a little bit.) To save time on the day of, this could also be done overnight at 210F and then heat up just before serving. If using short ribs instead of brisket, take the lid off for half an hour and crank up the heat to 375F before serving to give the fat a good char, almost as if it were caramelized.