Wiener Tafelspitz - Recipe

Prepare the meat, onions, carrots, celery root, leek, garlic, bay leaves and pepper for the stock. The meat is started in cold water; the skimming only comes afterwards during the slow heating.

Add onions, carrots, celery, leek, garlic, bay leaves, pepper and a little salt. Very important: heat slowly and do not let the pot boil rapidly. Then let the meat with the vegetables draw very gently for 2 to 2½ hours. The stock should stay clear and cook the beef juicy.

With classic Wiener Tafelspitz, calm decides everything. The broth may only move quietly, not boil strongly. That is how the meat stays tender and the soup stays clean in flavour.

Lift the cooked meat out of the broth and let it rest for about 10 minutes. Then cut it into nice slices across the grain. This is exactly how the tafelspitz stays juicy and pleasantly tender when served.

Melt the butter, briefly sweat the finely chopped garlic, then add the leaf spinach. When it collapses, stir in the cream and season with salt and a little nutmeg. The spinach should stay leafy and not turn into purée.

At the end, pass the soup through a fine sieve, season it and serve it together with the meat. For the apple horseradish, stew apples with sugar, lemon juice and a little soup until soft, purée coarsely and only at the end stir in the freshly grated horseradish.