Classic pot-au-feu recipe (Quebec's boiled beef & vegetable stew) (2024)

FAQs

What is a traditional French pot-au-feu made of? ›

What is pot-au-feu made of? The iconic French dish pot-au-feu, or "pot on the fire," is a stew composed of meat — typically an assortment of beef cuts — along with carrots, potatoes, and an array of other vegetables.

Pot-au-feu (/ˌpɒtoʊˈfɜːr/, French: [pɔt‿o fø]; lit. 'pot on the fire') is a French dish of slowly boiled meat and vegetables, usually served as two courses: first the broth (bouillon) and then the meat (bouilli) and vegetables.

It's a beef and vegetable stew, similar to the traditional American beef stew, but made with much higher quality meat and vegetables. As a result, the taste of pot-au-feu is rich and hearty but not overwhelming.

Serve: Once everything is cooked to perfection, remove the bouquet garni and serve the meat and vegetables in deep dishes. Ladle the broth over the top, ensuring everyone gets a hearty serving of this warm delight. Traditionally, Pot-au-Feu is enjoyed with Dijon mustard, gherkins, and crusty French bread.

This generous and extremely fragrant dish goes wonderfully with Rhône Valley tannic and expressive red wines so long as they are young but also with lighter red wines such as Beaujolais or Loire Valley wines that add a certain amount of freshness to the meat.

The Quintessential Family Meal of France

Pot-au-feu is a slowly simmered meat and vegetable dish that appears on most home tables in France. Pot au Feu, which literally translates to 'pot in the fire', started its life in working-class homes as a way to make less expensive cuts of beef more tender and palatable.

The national dish of France is Pot-au-Feu and is a classic comfort dish prepared using stewed meats and vegetables.

What is Poutine? Poutine is Canada's national dish, which usually consists of french fries topped with cheese curds and hot gravy.

There isn't a “national vegetable” as I know. We eat a lot of potatoes and you'll always find tomatoes, courgettes, cucumbers, carrots, aubergines, mushrooms, etc. With some of these… You can of course make… a very good Ratatouille !!

Bouillabaisse – a stew of mixed herbs, fish, and vegetables. Garbure – a thick French soup or stew of ham with cabbage and other vegetables, usually with cheese and stale bread added. Oille – a French potée or soup believed to be the forerunner of pot-au-feu composed of various meats and vegetables.

What wine goes with pot-au-feu? ›

And I recommend only one wine with the pot-au-feu: a quality red Burgundy. You need a solid, mature wine with a certain length in the mouth...

While most historians agree that pho was invented in the late 19th and early 20th Century in northern Vietnam during French colonial times, its origins are murky. Some believe pho was an adaptation of the French one-pot beef and vegetable stew pot-au-feu, which shares a phonetic similarity to "phở".

Pot-au-feu's origins are somewhat obscure. Although the Romans are known to have made something similar, the earliest reference to it does not appear until the 12th century; even then, the details are sketchy. What is certain, however, is that, in these early days, it was a humble dish, eaten mainly by the poor.

However, it seems that the earliest recipes for pot-au-feu were not published until the first half of the 19th century. According to Willan, pot-au-feu evolved from an earlier dish called pot pourri, a popular dish of the 17th and 18th centuries.