Tafelspitz

As tradition built it

Serves 4. About 2 hours.

Ingredients

• 1.2 kg beef bones
• 1 kg Tafelspitz cut (rump/tail end)
• about 400 g in total, roughly diced soup vegetables: carrot, celeriac, leek, onion
• 1 spice sachet: thyme, bay leaf, clove, peppercorns
• to taste salt

For the Apfelkren

• 2 apples, grated
• 2 to 3 tbsp lemon juice
• 15 g, freshly grated horseradish
• 10 g sugar
• 1 tbsp oil
• a pinch salt

For the Schnittlauchsauce

• 100 g, crusts removed bread, soaked in milk and squeezed out
• 200 ml milk, for soaking the bread
• 1, hard-boiled cooked egg yolk, sieved with the soaked bread
• 1 raw egg yolk, stirred in
• 1 tsp mustard
• 1 tbsp vinegar
• a pinch sugar
• 100 ml, worked in gradually oil, worked in to a creamy sauce
• a small bunch, chopped chives, folded through at the end

Method

1. Bring the bones to the boil in water, skimming repeatedly until the liquid runs clear.
2. Add the Tafelspitz and the spice sachet. Simmer gently, never a rolling boil, for around 1.5 hours, skimming as needed.
3. Add the roughly diced soup vegetables, salt, and simmer a further 30 minutes.
4. Rest the meat briefly, then slice diagonally against the grain.
5. Serve in a little of its own broth, with Apfelkren (grated apple, lemon juice, horseradish, sugar and oil), Schnittlauchsauce (bread soaked in milk, worked with egg yolk, mustard, vinegar, a little sugar and oil to a creamy sauce, then finished with chives), roast potatoes and spinach alongside.

What a modern chef changes

A held low temperature for the meat itself, and a properly clarified broth for the accompanying consommé

Rung 2

Method

1. Hold the Tafelspitz in a water bath at 58°C for 12 hours, sealed with a portion of the aromatics, rather than simmering it directly in the broth. This achieves the same collagen-to-gelatine conversion the traditional gentle simmer aims for, but with total control over the muscle's final temperature, removing any risk of the fibre seizing toward dryness, since the bath never approaches simmering heat at any point.
2. Build the broth separately from the bones and vegetables as a proper consommé, clarified with an egg-white raft, then pass it through the chinois for genuine clarity rather than serving it cloudy. Finish the sous-vide beef in the hot, clarified broth for a minute only, purely to warm the surface, before slicing.
3. Pass the Apfelkren through the chinois after grating and mixing, for a silkier, fibre-free sauce than the traditional coarse grate gives, a direct, simple use of kit already in the reader's kitchen for a genuine textural improvement.