Beef Stroganoff

Don't get me wrong, I love my mom's Beef Stroganoff. However, the last time I was eating it I found myself thinking about the authenticity of the dish because it tasted like beef gravy over noodles. Sure enough, after a quick google I found that there are two kinds. The American kind (the gravy kind) and the Russian kind (probably not as gravy-like). This dish I also found to have a pretty interesting history...

Once upon a time there was Tsar Peter the Great and he was really keen on modernizing Russia. So he went to all the other European countries and picked what he liked of each one. In France he fell in love with the food so he shipped a bunch of his chefs to France to learn French cooking (and sent from French chefs to Russia) and brought a bunch of new recipes into the Russian cuisine. This was likely the origin of the dish, however the refined (and name Stroganoff) came from Count Pavel Stroganoff's kitchen. He was known for his entertaining and was a known gourmet. The dish in 1891 won the L'Art Culinare, thus putting it on the map of Awesome Food.

Fast forward to the 1950s and suddenly the dish became popular and once again became the dish to serve at parties and in restaurants. It was probably around here that Stroganoff lost it's french touch and became ...well, gravy.

So I've decided to take it upon myself and reconstruct a version of the meal that might have been seen around the late 1800s. Will it be accurate? Who knows! (Unless The Doctor shows up and decides to send me back in time for a taste test...)

Ingredients!
Beef, pounded flat and cut into thin strips
Onion, chopped
Butter, several tablespoons
Tomato paste, two tablespoons
Dry white wine, about half a cup
Beef broth, one can
Mushrooms, chopped thin
Sour cream, about half a cup
Salt/Pepper
Paprika, about a teaspoon
Ground mustard, about a teaspoon
Flour

Instructions!
Salt and pepper the beef, coat in flour. Melt butter in pan large enough to hold all the sauce. Add beef to pan and cook until brown on both sides, careful not to burn. Add onion and cook until wilted. Add tomato paste, wine, paprika, and mustard and let cook for about ten minutes. Add mushrooms and beef broth, cook another ten minutes. The sauce should be thick at this point - if not, mix a little bit of water and a tablespoon of cornstarch and mix to a paste then add small amounts, stirring well, until the desired texture. Add the sour cream and mix well. Allow to cook for another five minutes and serve with the starch of your choosing.

Starch? Well, okay. I love my stroganoff with egg noodles. A lot of folks do. But egg noodles, again, isn't really Russian. They love pasta there, but it was another import. Traditionally this was probably originally served with fried potatoes, but I've seen it served with mashed potatoes or rice- so the choice is yours to make.

Conclusion!
Upon eating, the taste of stroganoff was still very much still there but had a much deeper flavor due to the addition of wine and tomato paste. I would definitely make this version again, and possibly even adopt it as my official stroganoff recipe.

Goodbye, beef gravy!