This is one of the western dish that I need to tackle badly. I had cook some really bad beef stroganoff (I mean really really bad like no one want to even look at it and taste it). My husband always complained about how bad my stroganoff taste. There was one time that he washed the cooked stroganoff  because he can’t bear the thought of throwing the unwanted dish down the bin. He recycled the beef into other dish. Since then, I have been traumatized to cook another beef stroganoff. Every time I found the  courage to try, he forbid me and offered himself to cook stroganoff instead (talking about some support and encouragement huh…).

There were no difference for this time as well. He offered himself and remind me of my last stroganoff (oh how supportive you my dear…). I said to him that I had been doing some research on the net and looking at few recipes on stroganoff. I choose the Masterchef recipe because I watched the show. However I didn’t have all the ingredients needed. Without him knowing, I just started to prepare everything in the kitchen. He actually caught me on coating the meat with the flour. He said that my last stroganoff failed because of the flour coating. I said I think I didn’t shake the excess flour last time and this time I shake it off thoroughly. He said his stroganoff doesn’t need the flour to coat (yeah you right because the sauce that he cook came from the instant packaging.. and I am doing everything from scratch.. come on, can’t he understand the difference???)

Because I wanted to cook the stroganoff so badly, I didn’t write the recipe on paper as I always do. I was sort of remembering the steps on my head. I did all the instructions as I remembered and VOILA the beef stroganoff minus paprika powder, Worcestershire sauce, beef stock, and sour cream (used thickened cream instead). My verdict wass not bad for a beginner but as usual I received complain from an “instant packaging Stroganoff sauce” expert.

The week after, I tried to cook another stroganoff. This time I used beef stock and paprika powder, but still didn’t use Worcestershire sauce and sour cream(as I thought creme de fraiche was thickened cream… LOL I found out that it was sour cream instead after reading Dorie Greenspan cookbook… what a coincidence). The verdict was much better from my previous one. I think it is probably best to stick to the original recipe. So I would try to cook it one more timeaccordingly for the sake of perfecting my stroganoff.If you would like the recipe, click here.

Culinary tradition: Russian

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