Belated Birthday Breakfast

I blogged this one, Étienne's Steak Au Poivre, on my web site: angelackerman.com. Step by step photos are on Instagram: angelackerman.

To read about the complex history of this dish, follow http://bit.ly/1DnVukM

Orange pepper steak

I bought steaks last night. At Target. Two steaks, normally $8.99 for the pair. They had a use or freeze date of today, so they had a coupon for $3 off. Plus I found a cartwheel coupon for 5% off Sutton and Dodge steaks. That brought the price of my steaks down to $5.59. Subtract my team member discount (55 cents) and then the red card discount (another 25 cents!) and the price is down for $4.80. 

My husband oiled my Le Creuset skillet with coconut oil and we slapped in the steaks. We covered them with fresh ground four color pepper.

I sliced a yellow pepper and added them to the pan. After the pan got hot, we added a tablespoon of butter.

As that cooked, we took some leftover plain white rice from the fridge. My husband warmed it, drizzled it with extra virgin olive oil and sprinkled parsley in it from my garden.

When the steaks were almost done, I poured triple sec all over them and turned up the heat to make a glaze. I added a pinch of nutmeg to keep the orange flavor from getting to strong.

This was so simple tasting and a refreshing blend of flavors.

Meaty hot lunch

It's another day expected to tap out at a max of 90 degrees. Another day of errands, doctor's appointment and finally work at 5 p.m.

I slipped back to Market after my shift last night for lettuce and noticed a ton of meats going out that night-- the ones that say sell by or freeze the next day.

Guess who bought a mix?

Me.

Steak. Pork chops. Chicken breast. And my lunch today-- Angus beef sirloin medallions wrapped on bacon. And my lettuce. $17.54.

The sirloin I'm making for lunch normally sells for $9.79.

I'm cooking the beef and some roasted cauliflower for a main meal with the family at noon. That beats the heat and allows me to have a nice meal before an evening shift.

The basic premise for roasting cauliflower:

- wash

- preheat oven to 450

- break or cut into hunks no bigger than a golf ball.

- spread on a cookie sheet

- brush with olive oil

- sprinkle with salt

- cook for 35 to 45 minutes turning every 15 until browned in a speckled fashion. You want crispy.

Fat Tuesday

I had no idea what to make for dinner so I swung through Target after a long shift...

I grabbed steaks, vegetables, strawberries and creme brûlée for my Fat Tuesday celebration.

My total bill came to $25.92.

- 4 small Angus steaks, $10, regularly $15.98
- fresh express iceberg garden salad, $1.47
- Green Giant fresh asparagus $2.49, regularly $3.49 (and was not in as good of condition as I thought when I bought it... Sad face)
- fresh strawberries, 1 quart, on sale for $2.49
- archer farm steam-in-bag broccoli, on sale for $1.89
- 2 boxes of Archer Farm creme brûlée (each with two servings), $5.99 each

Subtotal: $30.32
Team member discount: - 3.04
REDcard savings: - 1.36

What did I do with it?

When I got home, I touched off my enormous pépé mug with chai, and washed the asparagus. While my husband cooked the steaks with just a little garlic pepper and Italian seasoning, I cut some slits into the asparagus and spread some extra virgin olive oil and garlic pepper on them on the cookie sheet. I preheated the oven to 450 and really roasted that asparagus to a golden brown.

Then I split two raspberry Chobani "bites" with dark chocolate into three bowls and garnished with fresh strawberry slices.

That was the first course. The second course was a big old plate of salad. Third course was the asparagus.

Husband prepared the fourth course, the steam-in-bag broccoli drizzled with sesame oil and the steaks.

Dessert is the creme brûlée prepared by the child.

The wine is local apple wine from Stroudsburg.

Steak and zucchini cakes

Little Miss came home from winter Girl Scout camp, and since it's New Year's Eve tonight and I work the closing shift, I made a hot meal for lunch.

Over the summer I froze some shredded zucchini, and today I retrieved a pack of about 3.5 cups. Once thawed and drained of excess moisture, the zucchini yields about two cups.

The zucchini cakes are a variation of the crabbi-less cakes in Deidre Imus' Imus Ranch Cookbook. Today I made a use-up-the-leftover-Christmas-cheese version.

I started with 1.5 cups of cornflake crumbs, probably about 1.5 cups of various cubed cheese that I broke into tiny shreds (Colby jack, Gouda, and tomato laughing cow). For seasonings, I added about 1 teaspoon Italian seasoning, 1 teaspoon lemon Dijon mustard, 1 tablespoon ranch dressing, 1 tablespoon mayo, and 1/2 teaspoon low sodium soy sauce. Add an egg, shape into patties and fry about five minutes on each side being careful not to let the cheese stick to the pan.

I made little steaks with a brandy cream sauce.

Both of these (the zucchini cakes and the steak in brandy cream sauce) I've blogged about before. They are family favorites.

Top Round Steak

This is a combination of recipes I found online to do something a little different with the one pound top round steak I bought at Target for $3.50.

In my large Le Creuset skillet, I placed the steak, with about one teaspoon of cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil.

I preheated the oven to 350 degrees.

On the steak, I scattered the following:
- 1 clove diced garlic
- about 1.5 teaspoons fresh ground pepper
- about 2 teaspoons country herb blend
- about two teaspoons balsamic vinegar
- about one teaspoon low sodium soy sauce
- about two teaspoons lemon juice

I threw one can of potatoes around the steak and plan on baking it for about an hour. I placed my large pfaltzgraf platter over the top as a cover.

Hurricane Feast

The menu: steak with brandy cream sauce, salad with dried peas, sweet potato fries and iced coffee with almond milk, and for dessert Ghirardelli brownies (one box turtle and one box ultimate fudge). I mixed them together and used a cake pan, and I am pretty sure I used too much water, so they might be more like cake than brownies.

Nope, very rich and very much brownies.

The steak was selected to use it before Irene gets here, if I lose power due to the hurricane I don't want to lose my steak too. The salad was leftover from lunch the day before yesterday. The brandy sauce was in the freezer from the last time I made this dish (July 17) and it reheated just fine.

Dad's almost steak dinner

Dinner with Grandma and Pop-pop on the mountain was an awesome success. My stepmom was still raving about the pork from our previous dinner, and one again she could not believe that she ate vegetables! In this case, asparagus.

I kept things as simple as I could since I was cooking in a strange kitchen-- a new experience for me. My step-mom's stove has a slight slant opposite the one my stove has and in sink is across the room from her stove, which in my house, the sink and stove are neighbors.

Now, the ingredients for dinner probably cost between $16 and $20, to serve 5. Most of the ingredients came from Aldi. I splurged and bought a $12 bottle of French brandy (St. Remy, since I can't afford Hennessey).

The menu: steak au poivre (pepper steak in a brandy cream sauce), mushrooms, parsleyed potatoes and asparagus in lemon-dill sauce. 

Problem strikes right off the bat when I open the meat and see I got some sort of flank steak instead of real steak. It looks like the kind of meat you use to a make a real steak sandwich that's not a chip steak.

I worried what my dad would think, but I couldn't waste time on that. This was dinner and I had to make it. My husband trimmed the fat off and I turned my attention to my work-in-progress. I started the Le Creuset skillet on low with a smidgeon of extra virgin cold pressed olive oil from Forks Mediterranean  Deli. I spread it with my fingers to cover the whole pan and when it got hot I added a tablespoon of butter and the small can of mushrooms I picked up at Aldi. I sautéed them for a few minutes and added probably about three tablespoons of brandy and about 2 teaspoons of my organic four-color peppercorn that I've had for a while.

I opened three cans of whole new potatoes and drained them. I'm a relatively large saucepan I melted six tablespoons of butter with close to a tablespoon of dried parsley and a sprinkle or two of Italian seasoning. Then I added the potatoes and let them cook on low for the entire remainder of the cooking time. 

In a Pyrex dish, I arranged one bag of frozen asparagus spears (also Aldi) which I thought had thawed out during the drive. In a small saucepan, I combined about three tablespoons butter, the juice of one small lemon, and a teaspoon or two of it's a dilly seasoning, a former favorite McCormick spice that I'm almost out of. I poured this over the asparagus and the fats instantly re-hardened. Yeah, the asparagus was still frozen. Oops. So I put it in the oven on 250, my temp for holding the steaks.

So, now the steaks. I removed the mushrooms from the skillet and put them on the holding plate to go in the oven. The steaks have been seasoned on both sides with more four-color peppercorn, thanks to my husband's help.  We toss them in the skillet and their thinness and their lack of fat make them stick in the now hot pan. I quickly add two tablespoons of butter. 

I flip each piece of meat every two minutes because they are so thin, removing them to the holding plate when I think they're done enough not to make anyone ill. By the time all the steaks are done, I add some olive oil to the skillet and try to loosen the glazed bits. I add another 3 or 4 tablespoons butter, drain the meat juice from the holding plate into the skillet and replace the meat in the oven.

The asparagus is still frozen. But the plan is to microwave briefly and "fluff."

Back to the sauce... The butter and meat juices bubble and when they start to boil, I added the 1/2 cup brandy.  I reduce it down as the recipe says, 2-3 minutes, by half I think, and then I add 3/4 cup whole milk (my step mom doesn't have the constitution for heavy cream.). I repeat the boiling down. 

Then, we microwave the asparagus and serve everything. Everything disappeared. Everyone had seconds of everything. Except me. I don't like mushrooms. 

Asian-style steak leftovers

I'm sure I've posted my Asian-style sauce recipe before... Last night I planned to marinate the leftover meat from the weekend, the asparagus and the carrots, with some added "california blend" veggies from the freezer... I mixed all that into the sauce and let it marinate overnight.

Now, I'm heating my Le Creuset skillet with about a teaspoon butter, a teaspoon extra virgin olive oil, 1 tablespoon walnut oil and almost two tablespoons sesame oil to stir-fry everything.

I have rice in the steamer.

Clicking "asian" will lead to some variations in the sauce. Or this is the basic recipe:
http://angelfoodcooking.blogspot.com/2010/02/stir-fry-with-seitan.html

*note* part of the reason I made this was to use up leftover pineapple. I forgot the pineapple! Had I remembered the pineapple I would have sauteed it in the oil before I added anything else.

Steak sandwiches

So I sliced the leftover steak au poivre into slivers and layed it into my skillet. I cooked it on low to warm it and get the pink out, and sprinkled it with garlic pepper. I added the leftover brandy cream sauce and cooked the meat slowly in the sauce with the last of the frozen parsley from my garden (about 2 tablespoons 'fresh' parsley).

I thawed the last (and very nice looking) loaf of homemade bread. Added a nice helping of leftover gratin, the spinach-cauliflower gratin I adapted from a Wegmans recipe.

Heated the gratin.

Added some slices of meat to each little piece of bread with some 'gravy.'

Fantastic. (Better than the first time around.)

My husband agreed.

Steak au poivre with cauliflower-spinach gratin

For dinner tonight, I wanted to make another meal in my Le Creuset skillet. I opted for steak au poivre, but I'll tell you, the cut of steak I picked (a huge sirloin of 2 pounds I bought for $10) had way too much fat for my liking and I ended up cooking it medium-rare when I really don't like my meat with 'red.'

The menu:
Appetizer: dates
The meal: Steak au poivre with cauliflower-spinach gratin, with bread leftover from last night's Italian dinner with family
The wine: a French Cabernet Sauvignon, selected by a French friend

First, for an appetizer, I sliced some whole dates to get the pits out and arranged two dates on each bread plate like a flower.

Steak au poivre (Steak with pepper)
from the Internet (I no longer have the source)

• 4 (3/4 to 1 inch thick) boneless top-loin (strip) steaks 8-10 ounces each
• 1 tablespoon kosher salt (I use iodized sea salt)
• 2 tablespoons whole black peppercorns (I use organic four color peppercorns)
• 1 tablespoon vegetable oil (I use canola)
• 1/3 cup finely cut shallots (I substitute fresh chives and tonight I omitted them completely, but I thought it was detrimental to the gravy.)
• 1/2 stick butter, cut into four pieces of one tablespoon each
• 1/2 cup cognac or other brandy
• 3/4 cup heavy cream

Preheat oven to 200 degrees.

Pat steaks dry and season both sides with salt. Gently crush peppercorns using the bottom of a heavy skillet and press pepper evenly into both sides of meat.

Heat a 12-inch cast iron skillet over moderately high heat until hot (about three minutes). Add oil. Swirl evenly. Sauté steaks in two batches, turning over once. About six minutes for medium-rare.

Transfer steaks to heatproof platter. Place in oven to keep warm.

Drain fat from skillet. Add shallots and half the butter to the skillet and cook the shallots over moderately high heat, scraping, until shallots are well-browned all over.

Add cognac. (It may ignite!) Boil, stirring, until liquid is reduced to a glaze, 2 to 3 minutes. Add cream and any meat juices from the platter. Boil, stirring occasionally, until liquid is reduced by half. Add remaining butter and cook over low heat until incorporated. Serve sauce with steaks.

The gratin is an adaption from a recipe that appeared in Wegmans magazine.

Cauliflower and Spinach gratin:

• 1 head cauliflower, stemmed and cut into nice serving pieces
• 10 ounces spinach (I used 1 package frozen chopped spinach, heated and drained)
• salt and pepper
• 1 cup breadcrumbs
  
• Italian seasoning
• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1 cup soy milk
• 1 cup shredded mozzerella
• 1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil

Combine the cauliflower, the spinach, the milk, the cream, the seasonings, and the mozzerella and half the breadcrumbs. Grease 13 x 9 pan. Add mixture to pan. Cook for 20 minutes at 350. Stir. Cook another 20 minutes. Combine remaining bread crumbs with olive oil. Sprinkle on gratin and return to oven for a final 15 minutes.

Mme.'s French Dinner

I had a special opportunity for dinner tonight. I ate at the home of one of my former French professors. She has an annual tradition of cooking for some of her students. A French meal, or at least a simple one with as many French touches as Americans can put together.
She invited me this year, because I came back to Moravian last semester and we've kept in touch. I made her a CD of some of my favorite French songs, brought her some black cherry French jam, and she asked me to bring a first course... noting that she would have meat, vegetables, bread, cheese, salad and dessert.
That, of course, leaves fruit or pâté. The earlier entries detail my adventure making my $40 fruit salad. Which was a hit. Mme. even asked me for the recipe.
I came to dinner early so I could help, and Mme. also had the help of her stepdaughter and her friend. Of course, as a mom and a frequent host myself, I tried to anticipate Mme.'s needs. When she prepared the next course, I cleared the table. I did dishes as needed (it's amazing how quickly you can run out of forks).
But Mme. did a fabulous job. I love big multi-course dinners. With the modest portion sizes, you eat slower and since you usually have to sit and talk while the next course is prepared... it keeps you from overeating. And it's such an experience, especially when you have a great group around the table. We had nine tonight.

The courses:
1. Fruit- My honeyed Vouvray fruit salad
2. Main Course- Pan Seared Steaks and potato/green beans au gratin
3. Salad- Green salad with vinaigrette dressing
4. Cheese and Bread- Brie, goat cheese, and some other yummy cheese with baguette
5. Dessert- Chocolate mousse cone and fruit tart from wegmans
6. Coffee- expresso