Recipe: Classic French Daube a la Provencale from Bryan Martin

Yet again we find ourselves spending our valuable holiday time travelling with our son's basketball team to moderate-sized provincial towns.

The scary thing is that he is now playing at the under-18 men's championship. Doesn't seem that long ago when I could guard him easily and maybe even get the ball off him. Those days are long gone, his 15-year-old frame now stands a little under 6'3", which is 190cm and is, sadly, 15cm taller than the best I could do in growing. Even more scary is that he is on the small size. Some of these boys are huge, and the game is so fast it's just a pretty special thing to see your kids get to this level.

So we get to live in Ballarat for a week while he and his ACT team take on others from around the country. Like Geelong last year, it's not necessarily where you'd plan to spend a week, but now we are here we will make the most of it.

First up, Ballarat is a very neat town with beautiful old stone buildings that all clearly go back to the boom days of the Victorian gold rush. If you plonked this place in the south of France and taught the locals to speak guttural french, you be overjoyed to be here. It's a pretty happening town too, a lot of young professionals commute to Melbourne on an apparently very efficient Vic Rails system. There's a bar on every corner, good coffee just about everywhere and if you like food, and I know you do, some really good choices.

We also brought our bikes, and seeing as it's my birthday week, and I'm in my 50s, I got a new bike. The family were a little surprised that this is what they got me, but, as I say, nothing speaks this age like a guy in lycra. Actually I'm not allowed to wear this. I can but my marriage and lycra, I'm told, are mutually exclusive.

Anyway, it's like a two-wheel version of NightRider. A matte black Merida Ride 5000, the new model. So light, so well equipped, it replaces a well-used and 30-year-old Repco Eurosport Tri-A. Quite a bike in its day, too, that replaced my first bike, an Apollo 3. This new one should therefore take me through to a mobility scooter.

My life in four bikes.

There are tonnes of places to ride here, including along some reworked railway trails. We are staying in the Provincial hotel, a newly, like just this week, refurbished place near the railway station. The owners have ploughed over $4 million into this grand old hotel. It now has just 15 rooms that are huge and well appointed – well, almost, as they haven't quite finished the job, so you have to hunt around for stuff a bit.

A busy restaurant also exists here and they have a French theme to the menu, which fits the place. First night they knock out a pretty good daube. This is a southern beef stew that uses pickled pork to lard the stewing beef and give this dish its delicate richness.

This recipe harks back to one of the first travel writers, Richard Olney. Green bacon, or pickled pork, is easy to make and really does give the dish an authentic tick. It is generally served with macaroni, but you can use rice or potato, maybe some braised greens and, of course, a rustic red such as a malbec to go with it. Here's a short list of recommendations: Forge pizzeria, Mitchell Harris wine bar, Catfish Thai, The Mallow (pub grub and beer), Kambei Japanese, the Unicorn for brekkie, L'Espresso for coffee and, if it comes up, Lords and Lads for a hipster beard trim or haircut.

Daube a la Provencale
Start this recipe a few days beforehand.

2kg beef stewing meat
200g fatty pork belly
40g salt
1 tsp black peppercorns
2 star anise
6 juniper berry
10 cloves garlic
Mixed herbs: thyme, oregano, basil, parsley – all chopped
2 large onions
2 stalks celery
2 large carrots
½ bottle dry white wine
1 tin peeled tomatoes
rich beef stock as needed (recipe follows)
20g dried porcini mushrooms
handful black olives
10cm square piece pork skin, diced
Parsley, chopped to serve
olive oil
salt and pepper
plain flour

A few days before you intend to serve this, bring one cup of water to the boil with the three spices, two cloves garlic and salt. Steep until it cools and add the pork belly. Brine for 24 hours.

Rinse off the salt brine and cut into little batons (or lardons as they are commonly known), each with a good amount of fat included. In a mortar and pestle, grind four cloves of garlic with a little more salt and then grind in the herbs, adding olive oil to make it slightly liquid. Roll the pork lardons in this herb mixture.

Cut the steak into large cubes and make a slice in each to insert one of these lardons in each. It's a time-consuming job but worth it in more ways than you can imagine. Dust each piece of steak in a little flour and fry until crispy in more oil, set aside.

Chop the vegetables into quite large pieces and fry in oil in a heavy duty casserole dish with the spare garlic. You're not looking to add too much colour here, just get everything soft. Deglaze with wine and add the prepared stewing meat plus the tomatoes and enough stock to cover. Bring to a very low simmer. After an hour add the dried mushrooms and pork skin, half cover and let this bubble away for another three or four hours.

Once the meat is tender and the whole brew looks rich and awesome, add the olives and warm through.

Serve on macaroni and sprinkle with chopped parsley.

Beef stock
1kg beef bones
1 pig's foot, split
1 large onion, chopped
2 stalks celery, chopped
2 carrots, chopped
10 mushrooms, chopped
2 tbsp tomato paste
½ bottle red wine
½ cup port
oil, salt and pepper
Season the bones and rub with oil and roast until brown. Set aside.

In a stock pot, fry the vegetables in a little more oil until soft and starting to brown.

Add tomato paste, wine and port, reduce by half.

Add the pig's foot and bones and cover with water, simmer overnight over a very low heat. Strain, chill and skim off any fat.