Sunday Supper - Baeckeoffe

I saw Hubert Keller serve this to some contestants on Top Chef and was intrigued. I've never heard of this dish, cannot pronounce it even after I googled how to say it, and it has a rope of bread sealing the edges of the pan and lid while it bakes - that's a new technique for me. So I set about to make it for our Sunday Supper. It's great that my friends don't mind being guinea pigs and let me try out recipes on them!

marinate meat and veggies in wine

Click here for the recipe. It's a mixture of 3 kinds of meat (pork, beef, and lamb), you could easily use just one or two kinds though - I could hardly tell which was which after baking. I went to a local butcher for the meats and they were nice enough to cut them all up into bite sized cubes, that saved me a bunch of time but it isn't hard to do so don't let that stop you if you are going to cube it yourself. You marinade the meat in onions, leeks, herbs, carrots and a bottle of wine overnight. When you are ready to bake it, assemble the casserole by layering potatoes in the bottom of a large oven safe pot (note: you need a pot that has a lid with a vent hole in the top that can go in the oven), add the meat and vegetables, top with another layer of potatoes and the liquid from the marinade. Make a very simple bread dough from flour, water, and canola oil; shape it into a long rope that will go around your pot, put it around the edges of the pot and then push the lid down into the dough. Bake for at least 3.5 hours. I found the bread was getting too brown so put some foil over it about half way thru the cooking time. To serve, put the sealed casserole on the table and crack the bread seal open - then spoon into shallow bowls (or a plate).

make a bread rope the size of your pot

Notes for next time:
-it was still quite watery after baking for 4 hours. I will use less wine in the future.
-it could use a little more flavor - it needed much more salt and pepper than I put in. Also maybe more herbs.
-I added 4 carrots instead of the one that was called for, everyone wanted even more carrots.
-the bread is super crunchy and not really great to eat with the meal (although it is certainly edible), I would serve this with a nice loaf of crusty bread.

put it around the top of the pot and then push
the lid down on top, sealing the edge

I forgot to take a picture when it came out of the oven,
this is what the bread looked like baked on the pot though!