Beurre manié -- butter and flour worked together with the fingers into little balls and dropped into the simmering stew I'd wait until tomorrow to do it, so you can see how much it thickens ovenight (some liquid always seems to get absorbed)

Mitch, I would use one of two ways or a combo of both--
First, you can remove the meat and just simply reduce the sauce by simmering it uncovered on the cooktop and/or you can make a slurry of a couple of spoonfuls of flour mixed with a bit of water, stir/whisk until all the lumps are gone and add to the heated sauce. Cook a bit longer until it thickens up.

I would remove the meat first and do as compumom suggests becuase you don't want to boil the meat.

I use the butter method as described by cloudy christine - also works to make gravy when making pot roast. I agree to also wait until tomorrow.

thanks for all the above advice , I'll try a few things and report back.

For this dish, I would do the butter and flour mixed together as CC recommended. I think I saw Ina (Barefoot Contessa) do this recently with a similar/same recipe.

The buerre manie method adds fat to the gravy/sauce. If it's a lean sauce that's fine....but I quite often prefer not to add fat to my gravy....especially if I have uased a meat with some marbeling.
I remove some of the cool liquid, mix it with flour or cornstarch, and mix it well with the rest of the "gravy" and bring to a boil and cook for 3 minutes.
You need to estimate the amount of the liquid in the stew....and for a medium gravy, 2 T of flour per 2 cups of liquid is good.
Linda

If you use cornstarch instead of flour in Linda's method, keep in mind that cornstarch has greater thickening power, so use about half as much as recommended with flour.

An advantage of cornstarch is that it mixes easily with liquid, whereas it can be difficult to get the lumps out of a flour mixture. It gives a slightly different result too. Gravy thickened with cornstarch alone has more clarity. Flour makes a more milky looking gravy. You may prefer one over the other.

Jim

These were all great tips and I used both methods , the thickening was perfect,
and some of the liquid had also been absorbed.

I'm out of cornstarch, that's a good reminder for me to get more.

The Gourmet recipe called for a bottle of burgundy, I used a good Pinot ;
do you think the type of red wine makes a difference ? my other choice was a Chianti.

Sorry I didn't see this earlier. Thankfully it worked for you. I have made this dish with several different red wines and have found
It only matter that it is a good red wine.

Bon Appetit mon ami,

Mitch- which two methods? Beurre mani or flour or reduction?

I prefer to use potato starch or potato flour in place of cornstarch, and so you might want to add that to your shopping list for future use. One advantage of potato starch is that you do not have to make a slurry as you do with cornstarch. Otherwise, it gives a very similar result, although I like the potato flavor better. If you do add potato starch to hot liquid, you have to stir it in quickly. I used some last night, and I added to much at once and had to use the stick blender to smooth it out. If you are afraid of lumps (or don't have a stick blender for an emergency), you can make a slurry like you do with cornstarch. I ended up with the opposite problem and had to add stock to thin my sauce. I would not add raw flour to a sauce, but I will add some roux to a sauce that is already made.

Lars

compumom, I did the flour slurry first, then ended up doing a beurre manié to thicken it a bit more.
I'll get the potato flour and try that next time.

thanks again for all the help.