Name: Beef Tenderloin “à la Ficelle” with Roasted Beets, Bone Marrow Crouton, and Horseradish Sauce
Yield: Serves 4
Cuisine: French
Ingredients: Salt and freshly ground black pepper; 2 (750 ml) bottles dry white wine, such as Riesling, Gruener Veltliner, or Sylvaner; Sachet d’épices (3 tablespoons black peppercorns, 4 star anise, 2 tablespoons allspice, 6 cloves, 1 nutmeg, smashed, 1 tablespoon juniper berries, 3 long black Thai peppers, tied together in cheesecloth); ½ stalk celery, cut into mirepoix; 1 tablespoon sugar; 1 tablespoon butter; 8 small German butterball potatoes, cooked in salted water, peeled and halved; 2 to 3 large heirloom red or yellow beets, wrapped in foil and oven-baked until tender, peeled, and cut in batons; 5 tablespoons (50 g) finely grated horseradish (or to taste, adding more if you like it spicy); Slurry (1 tablespoon cornstarch mixed with 1 or 2 tablespoons water; optional); 8 pieces Bone Marrow Crouton; 18 ounces (500 g) trimmed beef tenderloin (about 5 inches/12 cm) long, halved widthwise; ½ cup (120 ml) crème fraîche; 1¼ cups (300 ml) dry Riesling, reduced to ⅓ cup (70 ml); 1¾ cups (420 ml) beef stock or White Chicken Stock, reduced by half; Freshly grated nutmeg; 12 to 16 pearl onions, peeled, blanched and glazed; 4 sprigs thyme; 1 small onion (80 g), cut into mirepoix; 1 sprig rosemary; 1 medium carrot (75 g), cut into mirepoix

Preparation info

Serves
4

Difficulty
Easy

Appears in

Gabriel Kreuther

By Gabriel Kreuther

Published 2021

About

I call this “a la Ficelle,” beef on a string—which often denotes meat cooked by turning on a string over a fire—because in France, one often poaches a piece of beef in a pot of stock that’s already cooking; in order to remove it easily one would tie a string to the meat, hanging over the side of the pot. and then you used the string to pull it out of the pot. This is tenderloin very gently poached and served with a horseradish sauce, which is not too diffe