Tag Archives: Beef

Skillet Goulash

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Currently cooking from The Best Simple Recipes from America’s Test Kitchen

Meet home run #84,612 from this book.

This one-pot dish features tender strips of steak and egg noodles in a flavorful sauce of onions, paprika, bell pepper, tomato paste, beef stock and sour cream. The sauce is mildly spicy from the paprika with a creamy tang from the sour cream. I had this on the table in less than 30 minutes after turning on the stove. And the leftovers were just as good as the first night’s meal. How can you beat that?

The dish starts of by browning a couple of strip steaks. Once they’ve gotten a nice crust on them, you set the steaks aside while you build the sauce in the same pan. An onion and a red bell pepper are sauteed until softened. Paprika and tomato paste are added and cooked briefly. Finally, beef stock and egg noodles are stirred into the pan and simmered until the noodles are tender. Just before serving, the steaks are thinly sliced and added to the pan, along with the sour cream.

Grilled Steaks with Homemade Steak Sauce

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Currently cooking from The Best Simple Recipes from America’s Test Kitchen

My days of buying steak sauce are over, unless I get lazy, but even that isn’t an excuse. This sauce is quick and easy, and you probably have all the ingredients in your pantry right now.

There’s a secret ingredient in this sauce. If you didn’t know what it was, you probably wouldn’t be able to guess it. The secret is raisins, plumped with hot water and then pureed. They disappear into the sauce, and give it a spicy sweetness.

The other main ingredients in the sauce are ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, Dijon mustard and vinegar. Whirl everything together in the food processor until smooth and spoon it over grilled steaks, grilled hamburgers, roasted potatoes, etc.

Chinese Orange Beef

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Currently cooking from The Best Simple Recipes from America’s Test Kitchen

As I went to make this dish, I realized that I didn’t have any Asian chili-garlic sauce. What I did have was some Sriracha sauce. I checked the ingredients and it (the sriracha sauce) had chili and garlic in it, so I figured it would work. And it did. This dish was good. Orangey and beefy. And spicy.

Spicy. Spicy. SPICY! OH MY GOD MY MOUTH IS BURNING!

Upon reflection, maybe I shouldn’t have used the full amount of chili sauce the recipe called for.

That little point aside, I really liked this dish. Like the rest of the recipes I’ve tried out of this book, this one was quick and easy. You start by searing slices of flank steak in a hot skillet. While the beef is browning, you make a sauce by mixing orange juice and orange zest, brown sugar, rice vinegar, soy sauce, fresh ginger, cornstarch and the aforementioned Asian chili-garlic sauce. When the meat is done, you simmer the sauce until it thickens, then add the beef back in.

BAM! THIS IS REALLY GOOD EVEN THOUGH MY MOUTH IS ON FIRE!

Note to self: Less Sriracha sauce next time.

Skillet Shepherd’s Pie

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Currently cooking from The Best Simple Recipes from America’s Test Kitchen

My second recipe out of this book is another winner. Shepherd’s pie make with frozen hashbrowns. Genius. And mighty tasty as well.

You start off by browning ground beef and onions in a large skillet. Once the meat is no longer pink, you stir in flour and beef broth to make a simple gravy. To finish off the filling, a package of frozen peas and carrots are stirred in (the recipe calls for thawing the veggies, but I was lazy and simply microwaved them for a few minutes; they were fine.).

As you are cooking the filling, a package of frozen hashbrowns gets nuked until they are tender. Once the filling is done, you sprinkle the potatoes over the filling and then broil the dish until the hashbrowns are browned and crispy.

So easy! And the entire dish only took about 30 minutes. Sigh. I love this book.

Broccoli Beef

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broccoli_beefCurrently cooking out of Make It Fast, Cook It Slow by Stephanie O’Dea

This was . . . okay. I think this is one of those dishes that is better prepared the traditional way, quickly stir-fried.

You start out by stirring together soy sauce, white wine, cider vinegar, sesame oil, garlic, brown sugar and crushed red pepper flakes in the slow cooker. Then you add thinly sliced beef and cook everything for 6 to 8 hours on low. When the meat is tender, you add frozen broccoli that has been thawed and cook the mixture until the broccoli is heated through.

I used fresh broccoli, and that was a mistake. The broccoli never got tender. Also, my meat fell apart and it became broccoli with an asian-flavored meat sauce. I quite liked the sauce, and I think it would work in a traditionally cooked broccoli beef dish.

Here’s the link to the recipe on O’Dea’s blog: http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2008/03/crockpot-broccoli-beef.html

Yankee Post Roast Redux

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pot_roastCurrently cooking from All About Braising by Molly Stevens

Here’s another homerun from Stevens’ book. I’ve made lots of pot roasts (and eaten even more), but I think this might be one of my favorites due to its simplicity and ease of preparation.

You start out by browning a roast (I used a 3 1/2 pound boneless beef chuck roast). Stevens uses the broiler, but I just browned my roast on the stovetop and deglazed the pot with some hard cider and chicken stock. An onion, thyme and bay leaves are added to the liquid and the meat is braised for 90 minutes. At that point, turnips, carrots and potatoes are added, and the roast cooks for another 90 minutes, or until all the veggies are done.

One of the best things I like about all these braised dishes are the amount of leftovers. I love that one dish feeds us for two or three days, and usually, the leftovers are even better than the original meal. This pot roast just got more tender and flavorful as the days went by. The only thing I might change next time is to use parsnips instead of turnips. The turnips are pretty aggressively flavored and tended to overwhelm the other vegetables.

Top Blade Steaks Smothered in Mushrooms & Onions

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Currently cooking from All About Braising by Molly Stevens

What do you get when you cook this

mushrooms1down to this

mushrooms2and then add a whole mess of these

onionsto these and cook the whole thing together for almost an hour and a half?

steaksYou get this

smothered_steaksBeefy, oniony, mushroomy goodness that melts in your mouth. I would buy this book for this recipe alone. You take four top blade or flat iron steaks and sear them. Then you cook down a pound and a half of mushrooms (I used button and cremini mushrooms) and two sliced onions. The pot gets deglazed with dry sherry and seasoned with salt, pepper, thyme and paprika. The meat is tucked into the mushrooms and onions and braised, on the stovetop, until tender, about 90 minutes. Finally, cream and some more dry sherry is added to the pot and cooked down to create a smooth, velvety sauce.

Did I mention how much I liked this dish? I served it over brown rice to mop up all that glorious sauce. I might have even licked the plate clean. I’m pretty sure Bryan did.

Beer and Molasses Flank Steak

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beer_molasses_flankCurrently cooking from Tasty by Roy Finamore

Who would have thought that a marinade that contains a lot of beer might make the meat taste like beer? Duh! Apparently not me. Neither Bryan nor I like the taste of beer, so after a few bites of this steak, we politely pushed it aside and concentrated on our roasted broccoli instead.

I might have mentioned here a time or two that Bryan and I eat a lot of flank steak. Besides being pretty inexpensive, this cut of meat is quick cooking and takes well to just about any marinade. You can grill it, broil it or cook it on the stovetop, and the leftovers reheat well.

Finamore’s marinade contains a bottle of beer, molasses, soy sauce, lime juice, garlic, ginger and hot peppers. I left out the hot peppers and ginger, mostly because I forgot to buy them at the grocery store. I let the meat marinate for about 4 hours before grilling it. If you like beer, you’ll probably like this marinade, since that was about all I could taste.

Short Ribs Provencale and Mashed Turnips with Garlic

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short_ribsCurrently cooking from The Carefree Cook by Rick Rodgers.

Out of these two recipes that made up dinner, the short ribs provencale was, by far, the best. It is one of those dishes that takes a bit of prep work, but then spends the rest of the time slowly stewing away in the oven while you do other things. As an added bonus, it made the house smell really, really good.

The dish starts by browning ribs on the stovetop, then adding onions, celery and canned tomatoes and popping the whole thing in the oven until the meat is tender and falling off the bone. Midway through baking, baby carrots are added.

Rodgers suggests serving the ribs and sauce over mashed potatoes. I was feeling adventurous and decided to try his recipe for mashed turnips. Honestly, they were pretty disappointing. They were watery and the strong turnip flavor almost overwhelmed the ribs.

We had lots of leftover ribs and sauce, so the next night, for dinner, I used the leftovers as a sauce for pasta. This dish was better than the original and worth making just for leftovers!

Barbecued Meat Loaves

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bbq_meatloafCurrently cooking out of The Carefree Cook by Rick Rodgers.

I have mixed feelings about this recipe. It was easy and fast, but I didn’t really like the taste of the meatloaves. The recipe calls for meatloaf mix, which is a mixture of equal parts ground beef, pork and veal. None of the grocery stores around here carried mealoaf mix, so I made my own using just beef and pork. The finished dish was very porky, but not in a good way.

Other than that (which, admittedly, is my own fault, not Rodgers’), I really liked the concept of this recipe. Instead of making one big meatloaf, you make four mini ones, shaped like doughnuts, which puts the cooking time at about 30 minutes. You use barbecue sauce in the mix as well as on top of the meatloaves. This gives the meatloaves a nice flavor and isn’t nearly as sweet as the standard ketchup.