This Brazilian Beef Stroganoff Made Us Beg Newlyweds For Their Recipe
Let’s wind back the clock a bit to when our friends Tim and Lina got married. They had a lovely reception complete with homemade Brazilian food (shout out to Lina’s mom) as Lina is originally from Brazil.
It was here that we were introduced to Brazilian Stroganoff, which is one of the tastiest dishes we’ve ever had. It was rich, creamy, and comforting, and we could have eaten four plates of it. 😋
After the wedding we immediately asked the new couple to send us the recipe because we just had to make it ourselves. But like most family recipes, Celia (Lina’s mom) didn’t have it written down and she improvises everything! She doesn't have set quantities that she always uses. So, Tim and Lina watched her mom make it again and translated her "eh, looks about right" approach into actual measurements so you (and us) can make this recipe at home. Don't be scared to adjust things to your personal taste — she certainly does!
Ingredients
1.2kg Beef Tenderloin*, sliced thin
4 tbsp Lime Juice
6 tbsp Oil (canola or vegetable)
4 tbsp Paprika
4 tbsp Cumin
3 tbsp Salt
1 tbsp Black Pepper
¾ cup Garlic, crushed or cut fine (yes, you read that quantity right)
2-3 Onions, finely diced
½ cup Rum
1 tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
3 tbsp Yellow Mustard
150ml Can of Tomato Paste
150ml Ketchup
1.5L Heavy Cream
500g Mushrooms, sliced ¼ inch thick
Lots of Batata Palha** (fried potato sticks)
Lots of Rice***
*We did not use beef tenderloin because beef prices in Canada right now are crazy. We opted for a cheaper cut. It still turned out great! Our friend Lina loves beef the most, but chicken can also be used for this recipe too. Want to make it vegetarian? Substitute the meat for fresh portobello mushrooms and dried (rehydrated) shiitake mushrooms.
**We found this at our local latin market. If you can’t find them, here’s a recipe.
***We made 4 cups of rice, but you’ll need more. We froze some leftovers without rice.
🧑🍳 Mediocre Note: This particular recipe creates a metric shitload of stroganoff. You can easily halve or quarter it. Or make the full batch and freeze some for when you have a craving. Make leftovers, it tastes even better the next day!
Note: Brittany was so hungry for stroganoff that she didn’t read the recipe right ended up slicing the onion instead of dicing. Oops.
How to Make Brazilian Beef Stroganoff
As with any recipe, we highly recommend doing your mise en place first. For this recipe, that means cutting up all the onions, garlic (we used a food processor to speed things up), mushrooms, and getting your beef ready to go. If you wanted to measure out all the spices and liquids, this would also be a good time to do that as well.
Before starting the recipe proper, be sure to let your beef soak in the lime juice for about 5 minutes to help impart some flavour. If you prep your beef first, you can let it marinate while you finish the rest of your prep work.
After all your ingredients have been prepped, start by browning the beef. We made the mistake of not doing this in batches, so we ended up boiling our beef a bit. Don’t be like us, brown in batches.
When you are approximately halfway done browning your beef, add in your spices (paprika, cumin, salt, pepper) and stir to coat the beef with it.
After your beef has been browned, throw in the onions and garlic and sauté them until they are nice and soft and smell fragrant.
GARLIC!!!
Once your onions and garlic have been cooked add your rum and worcestershire sauce. Stir and let the alcohol cook off.
🧑🍳 Mediocre Tip: The best way to know if the alcohol has been cooked off is to smell the food vapours. If it smells like a sharpie, there’s still alcohol in there.
After the rum has cooked out, it’s time to add the ketchup, mustard, and tomato paste. Stir to combine and cook for a few minutes to help mellow out the strong flavours of the mustard and tomato paste.
Everything almost didn’t fit in our Dutch oven…
Finally, add in the mushrooms and heavy cream and let everything simmer until the sauce thickens and tastes done. On the day of cooking, we simmered our stroganoff for approximately an hour and a half.
From our friend’s recipe:
“You know it is ready when the mushrooms are soft and all the flavors in the sauce feel well combined. If there is still too much acidity from the tomato, cook the sauce a bit more and it should mellow out.”
Simmering. Simmering. Simmering.
Add some extra seasoning to taste if you feel like it needs a little extra something (we didn’t), scoop some out onto a bed of rice, and top everything with a generous helping of Batata Palha (delicious fried potato sticks).
🧑🍳 Mediocre Tip: Put your rice in your rice cooker when it’s time to simmer! Since simmer time can vary, your rice will stay warm after it’s done cooking. If you don’t have a rice cooker… just wing it we guess.
Guaraná: A Love Story
At the wedding we also discovered Guaraná Antarctica, a guaraná-flavoured pop. If you like energy drinks you’re probably already pretty familiar with this flavor as it’s often included in energy drinks because it’s a natural stimulant. We’re obsessed, and will be purchasing more ASAP.
Our Review
👨🍳 Trevor: All of the beef stroganoff that I’ve eaten in my lifetime has been Italian style and almost always has come from a packet. This was my first time having Brazilian beef stroganoff and my god it was delicious. The flavours, the richness, the feeling of being completely and 100% content. I’m absolutely going to be making this again in the winter when the weather turns cold and I need something comforting.
👩🍳 Brittany: Eating Brazilian beef stroganoff is like a nice warm hug. It’s comforting. It feels familiar. You can feel the love it was made with. Maybe that was just me getting sappy at the wedding, but even eating it for the second time when I made it with Trevor I was like… god damn. This is good. One thing I wish we did when we made it was serve it with Brazilian cheese bread (Pão de Queijo) and salad like we had at the wedding. I’ll have to do that next time! (Because there will be a next time… it’s SO GOOD and is even better the next day.)
Our Rating
Taste: 5 out of 5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
Presentation: 4 out of 5 ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Affordability: 3 out of 5 ⭐⭐⭐ (why is beef so f*ing expensive)
This is the tastiest stroganoff that we’ve ever had, so a 5/5 on taste. The plating is okay, but the absolute mound of fried potato sticks definitely makes it look rustic.
Affordability is always tough. The price of food is really high, and beef especially can hurt your wallet if you’re buying a bunch of it. However, the cool thing about this recipe is that it’s very customizable. Don’t have beef and only have chicken? You’re making a chicken stroganoff. Don’t want to have any meat? Just use mushrooms!
You absolutely should go and make this. You will not regret it! Unless you’re lactose intolerant, in which case, dear god help you.
Lastly, for Lina’s mom:
Obrigada, Celia, por essa receita que gerou um prato delicioso. Estava perfeita!