Beef Stroganoff

Ingredients

Beef

• 700 gbeef fillet or thin flank, cut across the grain into strips 5 cm x 1 cm
• 2 tbspplain flour
• 1 tspsalt
• 1 tspground black pepper

Sauce

• 2onions, thinly sliced
• 60 gbutter
• 2 tbspsunflower oil
• 1 tbspstrong Russian or Dijon mustard
• 1 tsptomato purée (optional, a Soviet-era addition)
• 250 mlbeef stock
• 300 mlsmetana (soured cream, 20–30% fat), at room temperature
• 1 tbspchopped dill

To serve

• straw potatoes, deep-fried, which is the original accompaniment
• or buttered buckwheat kasha, or wide noodles

Directions

1. Firm the beef in the freezer for 20 minutes; it slices far more cleanly cold. Cut it across the grain into short strips, never into cubes.
2. Toss the strips with the flour, salt and pepper just before cooking. Do it any earlier and the flour goes wet and pasty.
3. Get a wide pan very hot with half the butter and all the oil. Sear the beef in three small batches, 60–90 seconds each, turning once, so it browns rather than stews. Lift each batch onto a plate.
4. Lower the heat, add the rest of the butter and the onions and cook 8–10 minutes until soft and golden.
5. Stir in the mustard and the tomato purée, cook 1 minute, then pour in the stock and simmer 3–4 minutes, scraping the base, until it lightly coats a spoon.
6. Take the pan off the heat and whisk in the smetana. It must not boil after this point, because soured cream splits at a rolling boil. If it looks thin, accept it and reduce the stock further next time.
7. Return the beef with any juices from the plate and warm through over low heat for 1–2 minutes only. The strips should still be pink at the centre.
8. Taste: it should taste sharply of mustard and soured cream, savoury rather than creamy. Scatter the dill and serve at once over straw potatoes.

Technique

• The original, printed in Elena Molokhovets’s A Gift to Young Housewives in 1871 as beef à la Stroganov with mustard, is beef, mustard, smetana and stock. No mushrooms, no paprika, no brandy, no double cream. All of those came later, and mostly abroad.
• The dish is named for the Stroganov family. The usual story credits their French chef Charles Brière in Odessa in the 1890s, which conflicts with the 1871 printing, so treat both accounts as unproven.
• Cook it fast. Stroganoff is a sauté, not a braise, and long cooking turns fillet grey and grainy.
• Straw potatoes, not rice or pasta, are what it was served with in Russia, and they are still the best thing to eat it with.

Substitutions

• No smetana: full-fat soured cream stabilised with 1 tsp flour, or crème fraîche, which is less sour and much less likely to split.
• No fillet: sirloin or thin flank sliced thinner, or thin-cut rump, seared just as fast.
• No Russian mustard: Dijon, plus a pinch of dry mustard powder for the heat.

Variations

• The Soviet canteen version with fried mushrooms and tomato paste, which is what most Russians actually grew up eating.
• A Finnish version that adds chopped pickled cucumber and is served with boiled potato.
• Restaurant versions finished off the heat with a splash of cognac.

History

Created in the 1860s in the kitchen of Count Alexander Grigorievich Stroganov; it was printed in Elena Molokhovets’s cookbook in 1871.

Frequently asked questions

What is Beef Stroganoff?

Beef Stroganoff is a main from Russia: sautéed beef strips in mustard-smetana sauce. Created in the 1860s in the kitchen of Count Alexander Grigorievich Stroganov; it was printed in Elena Molokhovets’s cookbook in 1871.

How long does Beef Stroganoff take to make?

Beef Stroganoff takes 20 min of preparation and 15 min of cooking. The recipe makes 4 servings. It is rated medium to make.

What can I substitute in Beef Stroganoff?

Yes, within limits. No smetana: full-fat soured cream stabilised with 1 tsp flour, or crème fraîche, which is less sour and much less likely to split. No fillet: sirloin or thin flank sliced thinner, or thin-cut rump, seared just as fast. No Russian mustard: Dijon, plus a pinch of dry mustard powder for the heat.

What is the most important thing to get right in Beef Stroganoff?

Firm the beef in the freezer for 20 minutes; it slices far more cleanly cold. Cut it across the grain into short strips, never into cubes.