Lisa Harp, Valdosta Today Food Contributor:

Bavette aux échalotes is a commonplace bistro dish.  Fancy for steak with onions.  This recipe, from the blog French Revolution, uses a cheap cut of meat—usually skirt steak or flank steak. Usually, it’s seared to medium-rare, topped with sautéed shallots, and glazed in red wine.

The author here made a slow-cooked version of bavette aux échalotes that more resembles Sunday Pot Roast.  She slowly caramelized the shallots until they were soft and sweet and deeply gold.  Then, in the same pot, she seared the two flank steaks to give them a nice barbecue-like bark, then poured some red wine and stock, garlic and thyme, and some of the caramelized shallots over them.

She left them to cook until the meat was fall-apart tender, and the red wine sauce sweet and reduced. She then just sliced up the steak–although she says it’s more like stew at this point, which is even better–topped it with the reserved caramelized onions, poured over the red wine jus, and topped with some fresh thyme for appearances.  Voila!  Rustic French.

Caramelized Shallots

• 20 shallots, peeled and thinly sliced
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• Salt

METHOD

Sauté on medium to medium-low for 40 minutes.  If the pan gets too dark and you are worried the shallots are burning, add in a little bit of water as need, and stir to scrape the bits off the bottom of the pan.  Once the shallots are deeply golden and soft, set aside.

Bavette aux Échalotes

• 2 1-pound flank steaks
• Salt and pepper
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1/2 cup red wine, like pinot noir
• 1 small bunch of thyme, tied with twine
• 6 cloves garlic, left whole in their jackets
• 1.5 cups beef broth
• One batch of Caramelized Shallots (as above)

METHOD