Well, not sure I’ll write tons on tourist traps and lemmings. I’ve always liked a relaxed, unself-conscious approach to food and dining and I would recommend it too if I weren’t aware that many of our American friends here want to make the most of their journey and thus avoid nonexperiences. But even a tourist trap can be an experience. I wish people wouldn’t worry so much about tourist traps, unless it is widely acknowledged that they serve bad food. There are two kinds of tourist traps, the ones that mean to cater to tourists and the ones that become a tourist trap out of the blue, without having seen it coming, just because word of mouth, the food press or -erm- food discussion boards have raved about them. If their ecosystem is fragile, it may happen that they can’t keep up with the quality. Some carry on gloriously, unchanged, so there’s really no rule that I can put my finger on. So stop worrying about tourist traps. Some tourist traps can be good. L’Ami Louis is the worst tourist trap of all, though it is not particularly known for catering to tourists since it is supposed to cater to VIPs. Nevertheless, it is a terrible restaurant; whether it’s because it’s a tourist trap or not, I do not know (or care).
Far more interesting is the bœuf bourguignon topic. I usually never order it in a restaurant since I can’t abide dry, stringy beef as they all are except in two cases; when the basic ingredient is beef cheek, and when it’s ordered at Chez Dumonet-Joséphine (yay! I’m Ptipois and I’m back. I just got tired of the name). I must add that I’ve never had tender bœuf bourguignon at someone’s home, but not everyone is so averse to stringy beef as I am. Dumonet is a fantastic chef for slow-cooked things, and last time I ordered it, and that was years ago, it was close to perfection. It was as it should be, rich, dark, sticky, messy, and meltingly tender. I’d never order bœuf bourguignon in any other restaurant except if it were the one under the Pyramide du Louvre back in the early 90s and chef André Daguin were alive. Which he isn’t anymore, unfortunately. Neither is the restaurant. He made it with beef cheek or maybe galinette (the very stringy muscle at the end of the calf, pretty hard to find now) and I never understood how he managed to get that dark, coating, shiny sauce. Come to think of it, maybe it was rather a daube gasconne. It would be worth asking his son Arnaud for the recipe.
I haven’t made bœuf bourguignon at home for decades, actually I recently realized that I had to stop marinating beef in red wine, for it toughens the meat. So I make rendang or gulyas (in my book it’s a soup, it’s a stew only outside of Hungary), or I braise beef cheek, or oxtail, or galinettes, adding the wine after browning. I finish the sauce with a little cocoa powder.
