JR’s Brandy Mustard Filets

The Chef told me “this should have been the first recipe to go on the blog.  It’s stupid good.”  This got me to thinking about which recipe was actually the first, and it should come as a surprise to no one that it was Fat Girl Special Dip from the resident FG herself. How classy!

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I think we can all agree that we’ve dialed up the taste-level here in the last few months, and that is thanks in no small part to all of our wonderful contributors. JR, the latest to finally give up the goods*, has got a recipe here that appears to be both simple and sophisticated. In my experience brandy and whipping cream make everything crazy succulent (see Barrett’s Sauteed Shroom Sauce for proof), so I have no doubt this is as fantastic as The Chef says.

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Besides, a girl can’t live on hot sausage and cream cheese alone… Well I guess she could, but it would probably be a lonely, brief existence that ended in heart disease and/or mauling by house cats. And nobody wants that.

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4 beef tenderloin steaks (about 2-3 inches thick)

4 tbsp butter

4 tbsp of dijon mustard

2 tsp of Worcestershire

1/2 cup brandy

1 cup whipping cream

salt and pepper

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1. Season steaks with salt and pepper.
2. Melt butter in a cast iron skillet over medium high heat. Cook steaks 5 minutes per side for medium rare.
3. Remove steaks to plate to rest.
4. Add mustard and Worcestershire to skillet. (If you wanted to add ‘shrooms here, I’d support you in that effort.) Season with pepper and and stir to combine. Remove skillet from heat.
5. Add brandy and ignite. When flame dies, return skillet to heat.
6. Add cream and boil for 2 mintues until reduced to a thin sauce. Pour over steaks to serve.

Serve these up with some roasted garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus. Dinner is served.

*It should be noted that The Chef stole this recipe from JR’s cookbook under the guise of visiting sweet Holly Hays yesterday. Let it never be said that Barrett doesn’t have a diabolical side. Especially when recipe-warfare is involved.

Dot’s Steak & Onions with Soy-Coffee Sauce

This is yet another sauce I used to sip like coffee which, incidentally, the sauce includes. Dot was always good at dinner-making, but this was one of my all-time faves.

The soy-coffee-worcestershire combo is as tasty as it is surprising. Serve this up with Barrett’s Best Mashed Potatoes – the goat cheese version sounds like a good match to me – and you’ve got a perfectly updated version of an American classic.

3-5 pound sirloin (you can also use flank or filet)
tenderizer
1 cup strong coffee
3/4 cup soy sauce
1 tbsp Worcestershire
1 tbsp vinegar
1 large onion, chopped

1. Mix all ingredients except sirloin and tenderizer.
2. Apply tenderizer to the steak and pour mixture over steak.
3. Marinate, turning every few hours at room temperature up to 4 hours (or marinate in fridge up to 24 hours).
4. Grill steak until medium-rare. (You can also bake, pan-sear, or broil the steaks if you prefer.)
5. While steak rests bring marinade and onions to a boil.
6. Slice steak and top with onion sauce. Reserve some for drinking if you are a non-recovering salt addict like myself.

Matambre ~ The “Hunger Killer” ~ Rolled Steak

Wikipedia tells me “Matambre” is a beef dish from Central America. The Chef tells me it  is called “The Hunger Killer.” As if that name weren’t enough, I have actually had this before, and it’s as good as the name would indicate.

1 whole flank steak, 1 1/2 to 2 lbs., double butterflied*
1 1/2 cup cherry tomatoes, halved
1 cup Gouda cheese, cubed
1 cup of Arugula, washed and patted dry
salt and pepper to taste
butcher’s twine

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. Double butterfly flank steak and tenderize. ( It’s pretty tricky, so ask your butcher to do it for you.)*
3. Season with salt and pepper. Top with arugula, tomato halves, and gouda.
4. Roll steak and tie at 1 1/2 inch intervals. ( Use the butcher’s twine for this step.)
5. Sear steak on all sides over medium high heat, seam-side down.
6. Put pan in oven until internal temperature of 140 is reached ( about 30 minutes).
7. Remove from oven and let rest 10 minutes. Remove twine and slice up.
8. Top with chimmichurri sauce.

*To do this yourself, split the meat almost – but not completely – through to the opposite edge. Open the two halves flat to resemble a butterfly shape. After butterflying, tenderize steak by placing plastic wrap over it and pounding with a meat mallet.

Bulgogi ~ Korean Lettuce Wraps

These are a fresh, yummy and easy treat for any night of the week. We grilled these in the fall, back when it was warm and balmy outside, which makes me a little sad-happy to think about. Sad for the current weather, but happy for the yum-yum of this recipe.

If you don’t have the cajones to brave the cold, you can cook these in a saute pan, but you’ll miss some of the flava. C’mon now, don’t be a wuss. Get out there and make me proud.

1 pound of flank steak, sliced as thinly as possible against the grain.

Marinade:
1 tablespoon of minced ginger
1 1/2 ounces of soy sauce
1 ounce of rice vinegar
1 ounce of sesame oil
handfuls of sliced green onions
3 garlic cloves, minced

1. Marinate meat for 2 hours. Grill off meat ( about 20 seconds per side). (Side note: Grilling or baking “off” anything is a very chefy term that just means the aforementioned word. If you’re in the mood to feel extraordinarily culinary, try using it in a sentence some time.)
2. Once cooked, stuff the lettuce with steak.

The Chef likes to top these with kimchi, pickled cucumbers, and hoison sauce and serve with coconut jasmine rice.

Rosemary-Dijon Steak Rub

I changed the name of this from “Steak Wet Rub” to “Rosemary-Dijon” because the ingredients made me want to eat it but the original title made me want to make some sort of dirty joke. Another wonderful suggestion from the West Coast. From Pitts: I’ve been doing this a lot lately. It holds up better for a ribeye or strip than a filet and also works great on pork chops, tenderloin, etc.

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4 cup dijon mustard

2-3 tablespoons chopped fresh rosemary

pinch of kosher salt

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1. Combine ingredients into a loose paste. Season steaks with salt and pepper, then liberally brush or rub them with the paste and let marinate 15-20 minutes or longer.
2. Throw them on the grill. Watch for flame-ups as the olive oil burns off, and move to a cooler part of the grill if necessary.

I almost always serve them with these potatoes because Aimee beats me down about making them. The finished product should be kind of crispy on the outside.

Filet Bites

This is another simple but yummy recipe from Morganthony’s Christmas Party 2K9. Morg really went above and beyond last year, probably because Tony’s obsession with Christmas requires we start celebrating early in November. That girl’s gonna make someone an excellent wife some day. April 16 to be exact.

Several filets (or another good cut of meat), cut into 1.5-inch cubes
1/4-1/2 stick of butter
salt and pepper to taste

1. Brown the butter in a skillet. (If you’ve never made browned butter before, you basically melt it over medium-low heat and whisk until it turns a hazlenut color. If you burn it start over. Burned butter is the only kind of butter that sucks.)
2. Cook salt-and-peppered steak in butter for a few minutes on each side stirring frequently (until medium-rare).
3. Serve with toothpicks on the jolliest Christmas tray you can find. I serve these with a mayo-horseradish dipping sauce (2:1 ratio of mayo to horseradish), but these are great naked or with A-1. Sorry, but my inner redneck loves that stuff.

Grilled Thai Beef Salad – “Yam Neua”

This list of ingredients looks long, but it’s basically grill, mix and dip. Plus cooking things called stuff like “Yam Neua” really makes you feel like you’ve expanded your cultural horizons. Like even more than when you watch Jersey Shore.

Dressing:
1/4 cilantro, chopped
2 tablespoons Serrano pepper, minced
3 garlic cloves , minced
2 tablespoons of light brown sugar
1 1/2 tablespoons fish sauce
1/4 teaspoons white pepper
4 ounces of lemon juice

1. Combine all of ingredients in a blender or a mixing bowl until sugar dissolves. It’s best to prepare this in advance so the flavors have time to meld.

Steak:
8 ounces of flank steak
1/2 lemon grass stalk (4 inch tender piece), trimmed and finely sliced
1 red onion, finely sliced
1 cucumber, finely sliced
1 tomato, cut into wedges
lettuce leaves. as needed
1 ounce peanuts, toasted and crushed

1. Grill steak to medium rare. Allow to rest and then slice thinly across the grain of the meat.
2. Add sliced meat and juices to a bowl and toss with dressing and remaining ingredients except lettuce leaves.
3. Place lettuce leaves on a plate and fill with grilled beef salad. Garnish with cilantro and crushed peanuts.

Coffee Steak Rub

It took a few tries to get the coffee flavor to come through, but now The Chef has it just right. The last time we made these I finished a steak twice the size of my head… a feat I believe only Harmon matched me in, so clearly I’m bursting with pride.

1/2 cup paprika
1/2 cup salt
1/2 cup black pepper
1/2 ground coffee

 

Mix ingredients thoroughly, dredge steak in the mixture, and grill up real nice. It’s that simple.
The Chef notes this is also really good in brisket.