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We're cooking

Wow. Those beef chunks have taken on a decidedly wine-colored hue after resting all day in their French table wine marinade. Some of them are purple-brown instead of red. I test my pan to make sure it's hot by letting a few drops of marinade splatter in the pan. I get a satisfying sputter from the hot oil, so I add in several pieces of beef, taking care not to crowd them.

We're cooking Gardiane La Camargue, French beef stew in the style of the cowboys Francais in the Camargue, south of Arles. The dish is from Patricia Wells' Bistro Cooking. Yesterday we cut the meat into 3- or 4-ounce pieces and prepped the carrots, onions and garlic before mixing it all together for an overnight marinade.

I opened my fridge and there it was! My well-marinated beef. All that I have to do now is throw it in a pot and cook it. Right? Whoops. There's a bunch to do today.

First, I need to let it come to room temperature. Given the fact that my three-year-old had to visit the doctor (ear infection), I really don't have time. So I'm going to skip that step and just give the meat as much "rest" as the time it takes to drain.

I set my beef chunks in a colander to drain, reserving the marinade ingredients in their big bowl, while I heated up my very favorite pan: a 12-inch cast-iron skillet. The instructions say to use two tablespoons of olive oil, and I just let the bottle do a few glugs until it seems as if my saucepan bottom is well-covered.

We're prepping

Whoops! A few hours have passed since we cut the meat into 3- or 4-ounce pieces. Sorry about that, the baby that was getting into the cat food last time, I realized he'd better have some human food. Oh well, such is life. Now it's time to prep the carrots, onions and garlic. The instructions just say "garlic cloves," not "minced" or "peeled" or "unpeeled."

Hmmm. I decided to just peel them and crush just a bit in the process (I smack them with the wide edge of my knife to loosen the skins). My cloves look a little small... so I use eight or nine. I love garlic. I decide to toss it all in. A little extra garlic never hurt anyone. Right?

We're prepping our ingredients for Gardiane La Camargue, French beef stew in the style of the cowboys Francais in the Camargue, south of Arles. The dish is from Patricia Wells' Bistro Cooking.

OK, I've started cutting the meat into pieces that are about four ounces each. For my first piece, I took a look at my whole hunk and used my brilliant math knowledge to figure out that four ounces is one-fourth of a pound, and I have about four pounds, so I need to cut my beef into approximate sixteenths.

Luckily, I just bought myself a sparkly new kitchen scale for Christmas. It's only the second time I've used it. I cut my first piece and stuck it on the scale. Four ounces on the dot! Wow, I'm good, I tell my eight-month-old smugly (realizing he's eating cat food. ooops).

I cut up the rest of the pieces, trying to keep a closer eye on the cat food, and end up with more three-ounce pieces than four-ounce pieces. It turns out my ideal piece is a two-and-a-half or three-inch cube, or an isosceles triangle with the long part being about four inches (it's beef, not a block of foam, after all). Next up: carrots, onions and garlic.

Today we'll be prepping our ingredients for Gardiane La Camargue, French beef stew in the style of the cowboys Francais in the Camargue, south of Arles. The dish is from Patricia Wells' Bistro Cooking. It's one day before serving and time to combine:

• 4-5 pounds stewing beef, cut into cubes weighing about four ounces each
• five cloves garlic
• 2-3 medium yellow onions, cut into rounds
• 4 carrots, peeled and cut into 1-inch lengths
• 1 bottle red wine such as Côtes-du-Rhône

The first thing I'm going to do is figure out what a four-ounce cube of beef should look like. I didn't ask my butcher to cut them, as recommended in Wells' recipe. Hmm...