Peposo (Peppery Tuscan Beef Stew

By KDHarmon

This Tuscan beef stew has a long history. The story goes that it was invented by the furnace workers (fornaciai) who baked the terracotta tiles for the Brunelleschi’s famous Duomo in Florence. They mixed roughly cut up beef shank, salt, lots of black pepper and red wine—Chianti, of course—in terracotta pots and let it all bake slowly in a corner of their furnace until it was time to eat. The original slow cooker recipe?

The dish is still popular in Tuscany today, and the little town of Impruneta, a few kilometers south of Florence, is well-known for its annual sagra (festival) dedicated to the dish. These days, peposo is more likely than not to be made with tomato sauce, but being the traditionalist I prefer the original, pre-Columbian version.

In any event, once you put the ingredients together in a pot and pop them in the oven—and there’s no browning or soffritto to mess with this time—this tasty dish quite literally cooks itself. After all, those fornaciai had more important matters to attend to… just like you. But I warn you, the ambrosial aroma of peposo as it slowly bakes in the oven can be very distracting.

Ingredients

• 1 kg (2 lbs) beef for stew
• 1 head of garlic
• 20g (3/4 oz) whole peppercorns
• Salt, preferably roughly sea salt, to taste
• 1 bottle red wine, preferably Chianti

Details

Servings 4
Adapted from memoriediangelina.com

Preparation

Step 1

Cut the beef into large chunks, along the natural muscle separations where possible.

Lay the beef chunks into the bottom of a terracotta pot and insert the garlic cloves interspersed among the beef chunks here and there. Sprinkle the whole peppercorns and salt over everything.
Pour over enough red wine to cover the beef.

Cover the pot and place in a slow oven (160C/324F) for 4 hours or more, until the beef is falling apart tender and the red wine has reduced into a rich sauce. If the dish is still too liquid and you're ready to eat, remove the cover, which will allow it to reduce more quickly. Although unconventional, just before serving you can also add a spoonful or two of potato starch mixed with an equal amount of water to give the sauce some liaison.

Makes 4-6 servings.