Cheater Beef Stroganoff

My husband's birthday was on Tuesday and that means I have much, much leftover food in my fridge. I always overcook, and this time was no exception. Several pounds of salmon (salads! I love cold salmon on salads!), chicken (wraps!) and steak leads me to my favourite way to rid myself of leftovers. I also have some light sour cream that I will forget about otherwise and far too many mushrooms (is there really such a thing as too many mushroom?) so here we are: let's get at it!

 

You will need:

2 c uncooked egg noodles (I am using No Yolks)
2 tsp olive oil (don't use EVOO)
1 onion, grated
3 garlic cloves, crushed
1/2 lb mushrooms, sliced, about 2 cups (you can buy 1/2 lb tubs all sliced for you. I don't like them because they slice them too thick, but I really should learn to pick my battles)
1/2 c red wine
2 c beef stock
1 lb cooked steak
Salt, pepper, paprika (I am using smoked hot paprika because I love it so)

First, prep! Grate your onions and crush your garlic into a large-ish heavy-bottom (makes the cooking world go round) saucepan. Slice the steak as thinly as possible. Putting it in the freezer for 10 minutes first helps fo sho. Slice your mushrooms or pull the saran wrap off your package, whatever your wallet and conscience dictates.

Add the oil to the saucepan with onions and garlic, heat to medium and add in the mushrooms. Cook for three minutes or until the onions are softened and most of the liquid is gone.

Pour in the wine and use a flat wooden spoon to scrape up everything off the bottom. Cook until most of the liquid is gone. Start to boil water for the egg noodles, cook, drain and set aside.

Add in the beef stock, sliced steak, salt, pepper and paprika. Bring to a boil and then reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes, until the liquid is reduced by half.

Remove from heat and stir in the sour cream. Check your seasoning. Stir in the cooked egg noodles, serve!

You know, it would look much better with BROAD egg noodles, but here's what I had

I portioned this into 4 servings at 350 calories per; add a salad or steamed veggies and boom! Under 400 - 500! And now I can see into my fridge.

Enjoy!

Swiss Steak

This is my other favourite recipe for beef minute steak; the first being the chicken fried steak. Actually I like this one better, and I've used the sauce for spaghetti and meatballs, which makes 4, 4 spaghetti sauces that I rotate! Ah ah ah. Do this on an afternoon when you have a little bit of time, say when you are making a few batches of bread! Renovated whole wheat bread plan to follow.

You will need:

2 lbs beef minute steak (hip or round)

2 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp black pepper

1/3 to 3/4 c all purpose flour

2 Tbsp vegetable oil

1 large onion

2 celery stalks

2 garlic cloves

1 Tbsp tomato paste

28 oz can diced tomatoes

1 Tbsp Worcestershire sauce

1 tsp oregano

1 tsp smoked paprika

1 1/2 c beef broth

In case you aren`t familiar with beef minute steak, it looks like this:

First, dump your flour into a pie plate and pre-heat your oven to 325 degrees. Season your meat with salt and pepper and dredge in the flour:

Leave the steaks out for 15 minutes to dry. Meanwhile, prep your veggies, by cubing your celery and slicing your onions thinly. Mince your garlic and set all aside. Heat the oil in a dutch oven until shimmering, brown each steak for two minutes on each side. 

Lookit thaaattt

Set aside and cover loosely with foil. Add the onions, celery and garlic, saute for 2 minutes until the onions start to brown.

I am relaxing my only-saute-garlic-for-one-minute rule because the celery has enough moisture to keep that schtuff from burning. And on! After the onions have browned, add in the oregano, paprika and tomato paste. Stir in the tomatoes, broth and Worcestershire sauce.

Scrape up all that flavour with your flat edge!

Steamy

Bring to a boil, return the steaks back into the pot, cover and bake in the oven at 325 for an hour and a half. I split this into 6 servings at 400 calories per. I added steamed veggies, some couscous and a salad with low-fat greek dressing and low-fat goat cheese, bam! Close to 500 calories! Yay us! 

Strip Steak with Peppercorn Sauce

Sooo, I was thinking we were going to grill these steaks this evening, until the hubby got a load of the incredible arctic wind blowing outside. I decided to make steak with peppercorn sauce, kind of on the fly. I've used this recipe for pork tenderloin as well, whatsever!

You will need:

1 lb striploin steak (take out of the fridge an hour before)

Kosher salt

2 Tbsp vegetable oil

3 Tbsp cracked peppercorns

1/2 onion, chopped finely

1/4 c cognac or brandy (I used whiskey because that's all I had)

1 c beef stock or broth

1/4 c whipping cream (plus more as necessary)

Not pictured: onions

To do your prep, get out a roasting pan with a rack and some tin foil. Take your steaks out of the fridge and sprinkle with kosher salt. I am making my supper with garlic mashed potatoes and asparagus, so I am scrubbing the potatoes, cutting out the eyes, chopping them up and putting them in a pot of cold water to boil. I am also de-skinning 5 garlic cloves to throw in at the last minute.

Back to the steak! Heat the oil in a cast iron skillet or solid-bottomed pan until it is very, very hot. Pat your steaks dry (the salt is going to draw moisture out and that may impair the steak's ability to brown) and place them in the very, very hot pan. Don't crowd the pan, so do it in batches if you need to. Crowding causes stewing and that is a terrible thing to do to a nice striploin. Leave it there for at least 4 minutes, until it will move freely when you try to pick it up.

Flip the steaks when they do pull off easily, turn the heat down to medium high. This will give you one crusty nummy side and one side that you can use to control how well done you want it. When the steaks are cooked how you like (check using your fingers. that's right, poke those suckers), place them on the rack in the roasting pan and cover both sides with the cracked pepper.

Not the crusty side

Cover with tented tinfoil and leave to rest. If you were like me, at this point you could potentially cut up some cauliflower, rinse it and put it in with the potatoes! In theory. Then you could cut a third off the bottom of your asparagus and rinse it also before placing it in your steamer basket.

Like zo

You may get a bit of over-browning on the bottom of the pan, manage your heat. I did batches and the first bit got a leetle dark, but ended up fine.

What the cooking teacher at NAIT called "carmellization"

When you are done all the steaks, cook the onions for 2 minutes until soft. Remove the pan from heat and pour in the booze. Return to the heat and use a flat wooden spoon to scrape up the lovely brown "carmellization" on the bottom of the pan. When the liquor is almost all gone, pour in the beef stock. Boil that until it is reduced enough to leave a trail going through the middle when you drag your flat spoon across. I am also going to add the garlic to my potatoes at this point and start steaming the asparagus.

Sorry, little steamy!

Add the whipping cream and boil it until it reduces to the same point, able to draw a gap across the middle. Add in the rest of the cracked black pepper, taste and add more whipping cream and / or salt as required.

This is where I mashed the potatoes with butter, then added salt, pepper and more garlic powder. You always want to do fat before milk, whether it is margarine or butter. I am also heating a pan with a tablespoon of olive oil in it. I am going to take the steamed asparagus and toss it lightly in the heated olive oil pan and sprinkle it with some pepper and kosher salt.

And this is what I end up with

Near!

Homemade Steak Sauce

I had a request for this recipe last night so I thought I would post it in case anyone else was looking for a super-fast steak sauce they can make at home. It is extraordinarily pungent, so you will want to open a window or use the fan. Or both. Oh yes.

I tried to make it look yummy, but...it's steak sauce

You will need:

1 c balsamic vinegar (don't use your expensive salad-dressing one)
1/2 c malt vinegar
1/3 c Worcestershire sauce
3 Tbsp tomato paste
2 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp onion powder
1/2 tsp salt

One of the few applications I have found for an adjustable tsp / Tbsp measure

Boil the balsamic vinegar in a large wide pan for 2-3 minutes, until reduced by half.

Befooooore

In half!

You may just want to time it, as the pan being so wide can make it difficult to tell reduction. Anyway, after it has reduced, add in the rest of the ingredients and continue boiling while stirring for a minute or two more. You should end up with a yield of around a cup.

Like zo!

Here are some more useful pictures of black (amazing tasting) goo:

Dip in me!

Or I will spread on you!

Friday: Chicken Fried Steak with Biscuits and Gravy

This meal is what I consider to be quintessentially American fare, keeping in mind that I am Canadian. These are the same buttermilk biscuits from before, with only thyme as the herb.

You will need:

2 lbs round steak, called minute steak (looks like it has been stretched and thoroughly abused) in 4 pieces

2 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp cracked black pepper

1 c all purpose flour

3 large eggs

1/4 c vegetable oil

2 c chicken broth

1/2 c homogenized milk

1/2 tsp thyme

Heat the oven to 250 degrees, season your meat on both sides with the salt and pepper and place your flour and eggs in two separate cake or pie pans.

Cake pans are good for containment

Dredge the steaks first in the flour, then the eggs, then back in the flour, then back in the eggs, then flour one more time. It`s a double dip! 

Dip dip!

Place on a wire rack and let sit for 15 minutes. During this time, you could do your biscuit prep! It`s listed down at the bottom. 

Trust me, will be so good

Heat enough oil to cover the bottom of a largish heavy-bottomed pan (my favourite pan!) until it shimmers.

Shimmering!

Add the steaks two-at-a-time, not crowding the pan. You want browning, NOT stewing! Again, don`t move the steak until it comes off the pan easily, if you have to pull it, it`s not ready. If it is browning too quickly and you are getting black bits in your pan, turn down and remove from heat for a moment.

Just until golden

Place the steaks back on the (now cleaned) wire racks in the oven. 

Add the remaining oil to the pan (at least 1 tablespoon) and stir in 3 Tbsp of the flour from the dredging pie pan, stirring fast and well. 

Whisking would be too frustrating at this point

Add the broth slowly, incorporating as you go. Keep stirring until the gravy comes to a boil and begins to thicken. 

I left in the chunks of batter because I like the crunch. If you are a purist, feel free to get them out

Add the milk and the thyme and stir constantly until the gravy coats the back of a spoon, about 5 to 10 minutes (hey, I don`t know how hot your pan is). Check the taste, I find this can be quite salty but usually needs just a hint of pepper. 

Spoon, meet gravy

Now we need biscuits! 

That`s a giraffe

You will need:

2 c all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp thyme leaves
1/3 c lard (or shortening. or butter, or a combination thereof. arf and arf is not bad)
1 c buttermilk or soured milk
1Tbsp butter, melted

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees, line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. In a decent sized bowl, mix the flour, baking powder, herbs, salt and baking soda.

I like to use the pastry cutter for that - less dishes!

Cut in the shortening or lard with a pastry blender or two butter knives. You can substitute butter in part or full, but they won't be as fluffy. Does everyone know how to cut stuff into flour? A pastry blender is the easiest, but a couple of butter knives pulling in opposite directions will do the same:

Keep your fat in the fridge for this, you want cold shortening, lard or butter

One kitchen gadget I love

You want the mixture to resemble bread crumbs:

Crumb-y

Add the buttermilk. *If you don't have buttermilk, pour a tablespoon of white vinegar into a one-cup measure and fill the rest with milk. Let it sour and voila! Buttermilk! Stir it in, dough will be sticky. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and lightly knead 10 times. Pat it into a circle, aboot an inch thick. You can roll it, but you are just going to get a rolling pin dirty for no good reason. That is pretty thick, don't make 'em thin. Cut it into traditional circles, or squares, whatever! Those are your biscuits, freak them right up. Tonight I am making jungle animals.

Dough right out of the bowl

Ready for kneading

Pat into a circle

About an inch thick

$5 to the first person that can name all these

Brush the tops with melted butter, bake for 14 to 16 minutes until just golden.

They can over-brown on the bottom, so keep an eye on them for the last minute, removing just as soon as they turn golden. Take them off the sheet immediately. Really fast!

So flaky

Near...

Far!

Far-er

Enjoy! Mashed potatoes are awesome with this!