The Essential James Beard Cookbook (20 page)

About 2 hours before you plan to cook the steaks, remove them from the refrigerator and leave them at room temperature. Before cooking, trim any excess fat from the side of the steak with a small, sharp paring knife, leaving just a thin strip for lubrication—a good piece of sirloin will be well marbled with fat and that will also lubricate the meat as it cooks. Fat is the flavor-giver for meat, and if you cut off all the fat you will take away some of the flavor of the meat, the part that has settled in the fat.

Now crush or grind the peppercorns very, very coarsely. If your peppermill doesn’t grind coarsely enough, it is advisable to crush them in a mortar and pestle, or to wrap them in a towel and beat them with a mallet, or you may use a blender or food processor, which does the job fast and isn’t so arduous.

Sprinkle the top of each steak with 1 to 1½ teaspoons of the coarsely ground peppercorns, and with the heel of your hand (which has the most strength in it), press the pepper into the meat. Turn the steaks and repeat on the other side. Let the steaks rest for 15 minutes before sautéing. Just about 2 minutes before you put the steaks on to cook, sprinkle one side with salt, using about ½ teaspoon for each steak. Many people tell you that this will draw out the juices but I maintain that when meat sears as fast as this does, the salt is absorbed and the surface immediately sealed.

Heat the butter and oil in the skillet over medium-high heat. As oil can be heated to a higher temperature than butter without burning, the oil prevents the butter from burning at the rather high heat one uses to sauté steak. For this reason, you should also use unsalted rather than salted butter, which is more inclined to burn. If you prefer, you may omit the butter and use all oil, or you can substitute beef drippings, if you have any, or chop up the fat you trimmed from the steak, throw that into the skillet and let it melt and render into fat.

When the fat is sizzling but not smoking (if it smokes, it is too hot, and you will have to throw it out and start again), place the steaks, salted side down, in the hot fat. The steak will sizzle as it hits the fat and you don’t want it to stick, so shake the skillet very gently to move the steaks around. Cook for about 3 minutes on that side, shaking the skillet back and forth very gently, then salt the uncooked side, turn the steaks with tongs, and cook 3 minutes on that side. Now reduce the heat to medium, turn the steaks again, and cook for 3 minutes more on each side—that’s 3 minutes a side for searing plus 3 minutes a side for cooking at the lower temperature, for a total of 12 minutes.

To make sure the steak is done to your taste, remove the skillet from the heat and with a very sharp paring knife and a fork make a small incision in the thickest part of the steak (or, if there is bone, next to the bone) and push the meat apart to see if it is cooked as you like it. If not, you may give the steaks a minute or two more. For this thickness, 6 minutes a side should give you a really rare steak. Eight minutes a side will give you medium-rare steak.

Transfer the steaks to a hot platter and keep warm. Shake the skillet well, remove it from the heat, and pour the Cognac into the skillet. Strike a long match and very carefully place it at the side of the skillet—the fumes of alcohol from the heated Cognac will immediately ignite and burn with a great flame, so keep your head and hands well out of range as you do this. Hold the skillet by the handle and shake it gently until the flames die down—they will have burned off all the excess fat and lifted the brown glaze from the bottom of the skillet, making a little sauce for the steak. Should a tiny bit of flame linger, tightly cover the pan. Pour the sauce over the steak and serve it at once.

Contrary to what some people think, the pepper should on no account be scraped off the steak before you eat it, but eaten and enjoyed. It’s really like a condiment, and it is that lovely charred peppery taste and crunchy crustiness on the outside that makes steak au poivre the great dish it is. You may serve the steaks as they come, or cut them into thin diagonal slices.

STEAK TARTARE

MAKES 6 SERVINGS

Probably the most famous of all raw meat dishes, steak tartare requires beef that is very tender and absolutely fresh. Serve as a light main course for luncheon with toast fingers on the side, or as a snack.

Editor: Because of the risk of food-borne illness associated with raw and undercooked meat, the USDA recommends cooking ground beef to an internal temperature of 160°F. And raw eggs have been known to carry the potentially harmful salmonella bacterium, and should not be served to people with compromised immune systems, the very young, or the elderly.

2 pounds beef fillet, sirloin, or top round, trimmed very well, with no fat

2 medium yellow onions, finely chopped

½ cup drained and rinsed nonpareil capers

¹
⁄
₃
cup Cognac

¼ cup finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley

2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

2 large egg yolks

2 teaspoons kosher salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Tabasco

6 anchovy fillets in oil, drained (optional)

1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley, plus more for garnish

6 large egg yolks, for serving (optional)

The best steak tartare is made of chopped (not ground) fillet. Using a heavy chef’s knife, cut the meat into finger strips and then chop it very finely. [
Editor: It helps if the meat is very well chilled, even partially frozen, for this step.
] Combine the meat with the onions, capers, Cognac, parsley, mustard, yolks, salt, and pepper, and season with Tabasco. You may, if you wish, add finely chopped anchovy fillets (in which case, reduce the salt, as anchovies are very salty), or serve the whole anchovy fillets on the side. Mix everything together very well and taste for seasoning.

If you have a food processor, cut the meat into cubes and put into the processor with the onions, roughly cut up, and the other ingredients, omitting the egg yolks (which will give the machine-chopped mixture an undesirable texture) and following the above advice about the anchovies. Process until the meat is finely ground and well mixed with the other ingredients.

Transfer the steak tartare to a bowl and gently mix in the parsley. For individual servings, form the tartare into 6 mounds on serving plates. Make a hollow in the top of each mound, drop a raw egg into each hollow, and garnish with more chopped parsley. The egg is to be mixed into the beef by each person.

VARIATION

COCKTAIL STEAK TARTARE:
For cocktail food, form the mixture into balls about ¼ inch in diameter, roll them in chopped fresh parsley or chopped hazelnuts, and pile them in a mound, to be speared with toothpicks.

SWISS STEAK

MAKES 4 SERVINGS

Swiss steak is a dependable, economical, easily prepared braised beef dish that has been an American favorite for a long time. How, I wonder, did it ever get that name? It’s not Swiss, and it’s not really steak, in our accepted usage of that word. Be that as it may, it’s delicious, simple, and enables you to make a good meal from an inexpensive and less tender cut of meat that needs long, slow cooking to make it tender. The best cuts for this are a piece of chuck steak from the shoulder or a bottom round of beef. If you are shopping in the supermarket, where meats are precut and packaged, look at the chuck steak carefully. If it has part of the blade bone in it and a lot of fat, don’t buy it. You are better off paying a little more and buying a piece of bottom round, which is all meat, rather than a piece of chuck with a lot of waste. The meat should be cut like a steak, from 2 to 2½ inches thick, weighing about 2 to 2½ pounds, which will serve 4 persons of good appetite. If you find a chuck steak without too much fat and just a tiny bit of bone, buy it. You can cut around the bone. Meat that has the least bone is the best buy, even though you may pay more for it.

To cook the Swiss steak you’ll need a very heavy skillet or sauté pan with a tight-fitting cover, about 2 to 3 inches deep, made of iron, stainless steel, or enameled cast iron. You’ll also need kitchen tongs and an old dinner plate or a cleaver or a meat pounder, to pound the flour into the steak. Plain boiled potatoes or boiled buttered noodles go well with this, and a salad. Drink the same kind of red wine you used in cooking and follow with cheese and fruit.

One 2- to 2½-pound chuck or bottom round steak, cut 2 to 2½ inches thick

½ cup or more of all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

4 tablespoons (½ stick) unsalted butter, butter and oil, bacon fat, or beef drippings

2 medium yellow onions, sliced

2 garlic cloves, coarsely chopped

1½ teaspoons kosher salt

1 to 1½ cups dry red wine

½ cup water or
Beef Stock

Chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley, for garnish

Put the meat on a cutting board and sprinkle the top quite heavily with flour—at least 2 or 3 tablespoons. Then grind ½ teaspoon pepper over it. Using the edge of the dinner plate, the back of a cleaver, or a meat pounder, pound the flour into the meat until a good deal of the flour is absorbed, working first along the width of the meat and then the length. Keep pounding so that the plate makes pressure marks in the meat and the flour holds in there. When you have done one side, dust off the excess flour and repeat the flour-and-pepper process on the other side. The steak should absorb 4 to 5 tablespoons of flour, which will give body to the sauce as it cooks and thickens it—this is the technique that makes it Swiss steak.

After the flour is pounded in, let the meat rest for 10 minutes. Melt the fat in the skillet over medium-high heat until is it bubbling and sizzling, but not smoking. Dip the meat in the remaining flour and place it in the hot fat. Let it bubble and sizzle over medium-high heat for 4 to 5 minutes, until deliciously brown on the underside, being careful not to let the flour burn. Just as you are about to turn the steak, add the onions and garlic to the pan. Turn the steak, brown it on the other side, and let the onions and garlic take on color. Sprinkle with the salt, remove the pan from the heat, and add the red wine and water. The wine will give the sauce a good color and richness, and when blended with the broth and water the flavor is not too intense. You should add just enough liquid to come halfway up the steak—you don’t want to inundate it, as you will get some liquid from the onions as they cook down.

Return the skillet to the heat, reduce to a simmer, cover tightly, and simmer for 1½ hours. Test for doneness with a fork or the point of a sharp knife and turn the steak. If it is tender enough (the fork or knife should penetrate the meat easily), taste the sauce to see if it needs more salt and pepper or more garlic. If it still needs cooking, cover again and continue simmering until tender. You don’t want the meat to be so tender that it loses all its texture, but it should be tender enough to cut easily.

When done, transfer the steak to a hot platter and, using a slotted spoon to drain off the liquid, spoon the onions over it. Then see if there is a lot of fat on the top of the sauce—there shouldn’t be, unless your beef was too fatty
.
To remove excess fat, let the sauce boil up for a minute, then remove the skillet from the heat and skim off the fat on the surface.

Pour the sauce over the steak, putting any surplus in a small bowl or gravy boat to be served separately, and sprinkle with some chopped parsley.

ZRAZYS NELSON

MAKES 6 SERVINGS

This Polish recipe involves three difference sautés—potatoes, cucumbers with mushrooms, and thick slices of tender fillet of beef.

[Editor: Zrazys are usually stuffed meat rolls, but this version is somewhat deconstructed from the classic. If you use the canned French-fried onions, heat them in a 350°F oven on a baking sheet until crisp, about 10 minutes.]

8 to 10 medium-small potatoes, scrubbed but unpeeled

12 tablespoons (1½ sticks) unsalted butter, or more as needed

Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

4 cucumbers, peeled and thinly sliced

18 firm white mushrooms, thinly sliced

¼ cup all-purpose flour

2 cups heavy cream

1 tablespoon tomato purée

Twelve ½-inch-thick slices of beef tenderloin

French Fried Onion Rings
or use canned French-fried onion rings

Put the potatoes in a large pot of lightly salted water. Bring to a boil and reduce the heat to medium. Cook until almost, but not quite, tender, when pierced with a sharp knife. Drain and rinse under cold running water. Peel the potatoes and slice about ¼ inch thick. Heat 4 tablespoons of the butter in a heavy skillet over medium-high heat. Sauté the potatoes in batches until nicely browned and crisp at the edges, about 10 minutes. Add more butter as needed. As they are cooked, sprinkle lightly with salt and pepper and transfer them to a large heatproof serving platter, making a bed for the beef. Keep warm in a 250°F oven.