Beef Wellington is a notoriously difficult thing to get right. Even for the best cooks, getting the beef and the puff pastry to the correct doneness at the very same time can be a little tricky. But this version of Beef Wellington doesn’t pose the same challenges. Because it uses ground beef (think of it like meatloaf meets puff pastry), there’s a lot more flexibility with temperature… but still a whole lot of amazing flavor.

Like a traditional Wellington, this still features a duxelles – a mixture of finely chopped mushrooms and onions that’s cooked down until it’s almost like a paste – so it feels much fancier than any standard meatloaf. Plus, how can anything wrapped in buttery puff pastry not feel at least a little fancy? But fancy doesn’t mean fussy or difficult. At least not in this case.

You start by mixing together the beef with some eggs, thyme, rosemary, Worcestershire, breadcrumbs and other goodies and shaping it into a loaf.

Next, you cook the duxelles and spread it out on the puff pastry once the mixture has cooled a bit, stopping about an inch and a half from the edge. The meat mixture goes on top…

… and the puff pastry gets folded over to seal all the goodness in.

A little egg wash helps things stick.

Set the Wellington seam side down on a baking sheet and cut a few slits in the top to allow steam to escape during cooking.

And then bake until the beef is cooked and the pastry is a lovely golden brown. You have a wider temperature range to play with here than you would with a tenderloin and if the meat gets a little bit overcooked, it’s not quite as big of a tragedy. It’s a much more manageable Wellington, but still totally scrumptious.