A Feast fit for a King 

Ali Altuntas, Head Chef at Chilston Park Hotel, has a passion for working with local produce. Ali prides himself on crafting unique flavour combinations and enjoys pairing food for an authentic dining experience. This exceptional Beef Wellington dish is testament to this culinary talent and passion.

Ingredients: Serves 2

• 1 x 340g fillet of beef
• 250g chestnut mushrooms
• 50g unsalted butter
• 1 large sprig of thyme
• 100ml dry white wine
• 60g pancake strips
• 500g pack of puff pastry
• 2 egg yolks
• 4 tablespoons olive oil

Method

Beef Fillet

Sit the beef fillet in a roasting tray and brush with 1 tablespoon of olive oil.

Season with salt and pepper and sear the wholeside for around 5 minutes.

Chill for 20 minutes, ideally in a blast chiller.

Mushroom duxelles

While the beef is cooling, chop the chestnut mushrooms as finely as possible so they have the texture of coarse breadcrumbs. You can use a food processor to do this, but make sure you pulse-chop the mushrooms so they don’t become a slurry.

Heat 3 tablespoons of the olive oil and the butter in a large pan and fry the mushrooms on a medium heat, with the thyme for about 10 mins, stirring often, until you have a softened mixture.

Season the mushroom mixture, pour over the dry white wine and cook for about 10 minutes until all the wine has been absorbed – the mixture should hold its shape when stirred.

Remove the mushroom duxelles from the pan to cool and discard the thyme.

Pancakes

Overlap two pieces of cling film over a large chopping board, lay the pancake strips and spread with duxelles.

Wrap this around the fillet on the cling film, using its edges to draw the pancakes around the fillet, then roll in the sausage shape, twisting the ends of the cling film to tighten it as you go.

Pastry

Chill the fillet while you roll out the pastry.

Dust your work surface with a little flour.

Roll out a third of the pack of puff pastry to a 21cm x 16cm strip and place on a non-stick baking sheet.

Unravel the fillet from the cling film and sit it in the centre of the smaller pastry strip.

Beat the egg yolks with 1 teaspoon of water and brush the pastry’s edges and the top and sides of the wrapped fillet.

Glaze all over with more egg yolk and put a lattice layer of puff pastry, brushed with more egg yolk, and chill for 30 minutes up to 24 hours, ideally 24 hours.

Brush the wellington with a little more egg yolk.

Cook until golden crispy at 180°; this should be 25-30 minutes for medium-rare beef and 30 minutes for a medium fillet.

Allow to stand for 10 minutes

To Serve…

Carve into thick slices and serve as you like, either with gratin or fondant potatoes and vegetables with peppercorn sauce.

Enjoy!