The perfect Sauerbraten without pickling

Ingredients for 5 servings:

• 1 ½ kg roast beef (false fillet)
• ½ celeriac
• 3 carrots
• 5 onions
• 1 tsp cane sugar
• 250 ml balsamic vinegar
• 200 ml red wine, dry
• 1 ½ liters of beef broth
• 1 cup of cream, 200 g
• 5 tsp mustard, hot
• 1 tsp soy sauce
• 4 allspice berries
• 1 tsp salt
• ½ tsp pepper, freshly ground
• Clarified butter

Instructions

Working time approx. 30 minutes; Rest time approx. 10 minutes; Cooking/baking time approx. 3 hours; Total time approx. 3 hours 40 minutes

Preheat the oven to 140 degrees Celsius (convection oven). Peel and roughly chop the vegetables. Season the mock fillet with pepper and salt, and sear in clarified butter. Then remove the meat and sear the vegetables. Once browned, caramelize with the brown sugar. Deglaze with the balsamic vinegar, then add half of the beef broth, red wine, allspice berries, and soy sauce, and let it reduce for about 20 minutes. Don’t be alarmed—it will smell awful due to the acidity. In the meantime, rub the roast well on all sides with the hot mustard. Place the vegetables and liquid in a casserole dish, add the roast, and braise in the oven at 140 degrees Celsius (284 degrees Fahrenheit) for 1 hour. Then turn and add the second half of the beef broth. Cover and let the roast braise in the covered casserole dish for 1.5 hours. Remove the roast and let it rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, add the cream to the casserole dish and puree the sauce. Slice the roast and let it simmer in the sauce for another 5 minutes. As a side dish, I recommend Bohemian yeast dumplings, raw Thuringian-style potato dumplings, or bread dumplings and red cabbage. The great thing about this recipe is that the roast doesn’t need to marinate for 5 days. The roasted flavors are also much more intense than with a marinated sauerbraten. Surprisingly, the mustard flavor blends in completely—you can’t taste the mustard, but it contributes significantly to the perfect texture of the meat.