This was the meal I cooked on the last day of the festive season, and I was pleasantly surprised by the results. Take no notice of those who want you to be perfect with all the silly technical details - as long as you get the ingredients to your satisfaction, a Beef Wellington is actually less fiddly work than making a lasagne.
There are two adults and three small children in the house, so I didn't make a huge one, hence the final photo making it look like a pasty... I can assure you it was actually much bigger than that.
Ingredients:
Beef fillet
Olive oil
7 to 10 brown mushrooms
2 red onions
2 or 3 cloves of garlic
A small glass of dry white wine
A cube of butter
Fresh herbs - I used sage, as I love it, but thyme is the traditional one
6 or 7 slices of Prosciutto or Serrano ham
A roll or two of puff pastry
1 or 2 beaten egg yolks
An appropriate amount of clingfilm
A blender or a bowl and hand blender
Instructions:
Put the beef in the oven for 25 mins at 200°C. While this is going on, blend up the mushrooms, red onions, garlic, herbs, some olive oil to make a duxelle, then fry it gently in more olive oil, adding the wine to give it some extra flavour. When it's time, take the beef out and let it cool down: it shouldn't be too well-cooked.
Lay the pastry out flat and put it on some clingfilm, so you can remove the shop-made paper (it's sometimes sticky and can ruin your pastry).
Place the prosciutto on the middle of the pastry layer where your beef will eventually go, and put some duxelle on the prosciutto. Put the beef on top, and spread the rest of the duxelle on the beef until it is covered.
Wrap the pastry over the top, fold in the corners, and glaze the pastry with an egg, sealing all the joins. Make some incisions in the surface of the pastry with the back of your knife, making sure you don't make a hole.
Recommended but not obligatory: put it in the fridge for 20 minutes. Glaze the surface once again, place the whole thing in the oven for 25 minutes on 200°C.
Let it rest for a few minutes before carving, preferably using a sharpened knife. Enjoy!
