French cuisine · Soups & Stews

Beef Consommé with Vegetables

Beef stock clarified with egg white, golden-clear and rich, with fine julienne vegetable strips.

Ingredients · for 4 servings

• 1 kg beef bones (marrow bones and shank)
• 400 g ground beef (lean)
• 3 carrots
• 1 leek
• 1 celery stalk
• 2 onions
• 3 egg whites
• 2 bay leaves
• 5 peppercorns
• 1/2 bunch chervil
• Salt, pepper

Instructions

1. Roast the beef bones in the oven at 220°C for 30 min. until dark brown, then set to simmer with 2.5 l cold water; char the halved onions cut-side down in a dry pan and add.
2. Add bay leaves and peppercorns and let the stock simmer over very low heat for 2 hrs., skimming off foam and fat repeatedly; then pour through a fine sieve and let cool completely.
3. Coarsely grate one carrot, half the leek and half the celery stalk and knead with the ground beef and egg whites into a clarification mix.
4. Stir the cold, defatted stock together with the clarification mix, heat slowly while stirring until it begins to simmer; from then on do not stir again – the mixture rises as a firm raft and binds all cloudiness.
5. Let the consommé simmer just below boiling for 45 min., then carefully pour through a sieve lined with paper towel without breaking the raft, and salt.
6. Cut the remaining carrots, leek and celery into fine julienne, cook for 2 min. in the consommé and serve the soup with picked chervil in warmed cups.