Category: Recipes

Rump Steak with Aioli and Potato Salad

Having hardly been kid-free for quite some time, and my son liking neither steak nor chops, Neil and I had been looking forward to a nice, juicy steak last night as we approached our much-anticipated kid-freeness. Then the message from Connor's dad came through, "Going to Dampier tonight", meaning my son is with us for another few days. Rethink time!!!!

Selfishness reigned. We decided that sausages were easily substituted for steak for the non-discerning (i.e. Connor), and went ahead with our own semi-formulated plan to have steak — but also noting in my iPhone's very slick shopping list app, Shopper, to get a couple of snags for Connor as well.

I opened MacGourmet and Neil and I browsed through all the recipes I filtered out as containing "steak". We shortlisted them, then finally decided on a pick of Neil's — something we hadn't tried before. To tell the truth, I was a bit dubious as it hadn't appealed hugely to me, but I'd given Neil the choice and that was it: Rump Steak with Aioli and Potato Salad. This was derived from a similar recipe on The Main Meal website.

In all, the flavours worked together far better than I'd imagined and this experiment resulted in another "keeper".

Rump Steak with Aioli and Potato Salad

Serves 2

Ingredients

• 400 g rump steak, halved
• Potato Salad
  • 300 g kipfler potatoes
  • 1 medium red capsicum, sliced thickly
  • 1 bunch asparagus
  • 2 tablespoons flat-leaf parsley leaves
  • 1 tablespoon lemon juice
  • olive oil
• Aioli
  • 1/4 cup good quality egg mayonnaise
  • 1 small clove garlic, crushed
  • 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped coriander leaves

Directions

1. Wash the potatoes, place in a saucepan and cover with cold water. Bring to boil and cook until just tender. Slice thickly.
2. Heat a BBQ plate or chargrill or other heavy pan. Spray the capsicum with oil and cook for a couple of minutes on each side until just tender. Remove.
3. Spray the pan with oil if necessary, and add the asparagus. Cook, turning, for a few minutes until bright green and tender-crisp. ("Tender-crisp". Love that term!) Remove.
4. Lightly brush the rump steaks with oil and season with salt and freshly-ground pepper. Add to pan and cook for 3 minutes or so each side for medium-rare to rare, depending on the thickness of the steak. If the steak is really spongy when you press on it lightly with your tongs, it is probably still raw. Keep testing as it cooks and feel how the resistance changes. This takes experience more than anything but you will eventually know when it's cooked "just right" for you. (I'm still getting the hang of this and wouldn't like to cook steak for numerous folks with different preferences, but for our own rare/medium-rare tastes we do ok.) When cooked to your liking, remove to a warmed plate and cover loosely with aluminium foil to rest for 5 minutes.
5. Place the potatoes in a bowl and season lightly with salt and pepper. Add the capsicum, asparagus and parsley. Drizzle with a little olive oil and add the lemon juice, and stir carefully to combine.
6. For the aioli, combine the mayonnaise, garlic and coriander, and spoon into a small bowl.
7. To serve, place salad on plates and overlap with steaks. Serve with aioli.

Posted by Vicki on Tuesday, November 03, 2009 at 07:19 PM in Recipes and Beef.

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Chianti Style Beef Rigatoni

Even The Fussy One (my youngest son) liked this one. It is always a risk turning him into a guinea pig, but in this case it paid off. ;-)

We'd actually planned to be guinea pigs tonight, but just for ourselves. I had Italian braciole in mind. Then (as is so often the case) my son's dad said he's going away today so my plans changed. There is no point cooking delicious gourmet food for someone who is unlikely to appreciate it. However, it becomes quite a challenge to find recipe ideas that I think my son will like. He's guaranteed to like anything with sausage or minced beef, but that really is kinda limiting...

I stuck with the Italian theme, bought (yes, I know!) some garlic bread, made a lovely garden salad, and served up this very simple dish. It turned out quite cheap as, although it uses an expensive cut of beef (fillet steak), it doesn't use a lot per person. Cooked lightly, it was tender and moist and there appeared to be heaps to go around. In fact, we expect to get a second meal (for three) out of it, but YYMV.

The original recipe is here but I made a lower fat version of it.

It's always especially successful when The Fussy One approves!

I hope you enjoy it too.

Chianti Style Beef Rigatoni

Serves 4-6

Ingredients

• 25 g unsalted butter
• 4 cloves garlic, thinly sliced
• 800 g canned chopped tomatoes
• 350 ml medium-bodied red wine (I used a cheap-but-ok cleanskin merlot and it was great)
• 400 g rigatoni pasta
• 250 g beef eye fillet, very thinly sliced
• 1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley, to serve

Directions

1. Melt butter in a large pan over medium heat. Add garlic. Stir for 1-2 minutes until golden.
2. Add tomato and stir for 5 minutes. Add half the wine, then simmer over medium-high heat for 15 minutes.
3. Add the remaining wine, then simmer for a further 15 minutes until well-reduced.
4. Cook pasta according to packet instructions. When almost cooked, heat oil in a frypan over high heat. Brown beef, in 2 batches, for 5-10 seconds each side.
5. Add beef and pan juices to sauce. Season, add drained pasta and toss.
6. Serve with parmesan and parsley.

Posted by Vicki on Tuesday, October 13, 2009 at 07:35 PM in Recipes and Beef and Mediterranean and Pasta.

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Beef Casserole with Parmesan Dumplings

I've had this recipe from Taste.com.au in my recipe database for a while now and, frankly, I'm sorry I didn't try it sooner.

I nearly messed up because I approximately halved the portions as there are only two of us — however I accidentally added the full amount of flour as thickener. More wine was thrown in and a bit more stock for good measure, and I crossed my fingers and hoped for the best.

All's well that ends well and this dish was a roaring success. Cooked very slowly on the stovetop, it had a rich, beefy flavour that left us both very enthusiastically saying, "Mmmm!"

Definitely a "keeper".

Serve with smooth and creamy mashed potato, and steamed vegies.

This casserole could easily be cooked in the slow cooker but I cooked it very, very slowly on the stovetop as there was such a relatively small amount of it.

Beef Casserole with Parmesan Dumplings

Serves 5-6

Ingredients

• 1 kg gravy beef or chuck steak, cut into 2cm chunks
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 onion, chopped
• 6 rashers bacon, chopped
• 500 g button mushrooms, halved
• 4 cloves garlic, peeled
• 2 tablespoons plain flour
• 2 cups (500ml) beef stock
• 1 cup (250ml) red wine
• 2 fresh thyme sprigs
• 3 bay leaves
• Parmesan Dumplings
  • 50 g butter
  • 2 cups (300g) self-raising flour
  • ½ cup (45g) parmesan
  • ¾ cup (185ml) milk

Directions

Posted by Vicki on Thursday, October 08, 2009 at 08:11 PM in Recipes and Beef and Casseroles and Stews and Slow Cooker.

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Za’atar Chicken with Orange Couscous

I've really enjoyed most of the Moroccan food I've tasted. I have a couple of beautiful Moroccan cookbooks too, and I love them as much for the photographs and insight into Moroccan culture as for the wonderful recipes.

However, it's this simple recipe from Taste.com.au that I make when I need a Moroccan fix and don't — or can't — take the time to slow-cook a meal in the tagine or spend a lot of time in front of the stove.

Za'atar Chicken with Orange Couscous

Serves 4

Ingredients

• ¼ cup (3 tbs) zaatar*
• 4 skinless chicken breast fillets
• ¼ cup (60ml) olive oil
• ⅓ cup (80ml) white wine
• ¾ cup (185ml) chicken stock
• 1 ½ cups (270g) couscous
• ⅓ cup toasted pine nuts
• 2 oranges, peeled, segmented, juice reserved (about 50ml)
• ½ cup coriander leaves
• 1 teaspoon ground cumin

Directions

1. Preheat the oven to 180°C.
2. Rub the zaatar all over the chicken.
3. Heat 2 tablespoons of the oil in a large, deep frypan over medium heat. Add the chicken and cook for 2 minutes each side until golden.
4. Transfer to a roasting pan and cook in the oven for about 10 minutes or until cooked through.
5. Wipe the frypan with paper towel, then heat over medium-high heat. Add the wine and cook for 1 minute, then add the stock.
6. Bring to the boil, add the couscous, remove from heat, cover and stand for 5 minutes.
7. Fluff the couscous with a fork and stir in the pine nuts, orange segments and coriander leaves.
8. Whisk the remaining olive oil and reserved orange juice in a small bowl with cumin. Add to the couscous and gently combine.
9. Slice the chicken breasts and serve on top of the couscous.

Notes

* Spice blend of thyme leaves, sumac, sesame seeds and salt from gourmet and Middle Eastern food stores.

Posted by Vicki on Monday, October 05, 2009 at 05:14 PM in Recipes and Chicken and Moroccan.

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Cheesy Meatballs with Spaghetti

My youngest son is notorious for being a fussy eater. Thankfully, he's getting a lot better — but I'm always on the lookout for kid-friendly food. This quick and easy recipe from Taste.com.au uses a jar of pasta sauce of your choice and some simple meatballs that have grated parmesan cheese mixed in. This means you don't need to add cheese on the top. We never do, but then again we need to watch our waistlines and you may not! Still, if you scatter some small basil leaves over the top before serving, you'll have a both delicious and attractive meal.

As an alternative to mixing grated cheese throughout the meatball mixture, you might want to cut cubes of cheese and pop them in the middle of each meatball as a tasty surprise.

Cheesy Meatballs with Spaghetti

Serves 4

Ingredients

• 500 g lean beef mince
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1 cup grated tasty cheese
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• ¼ cup chopped basil
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 x 570g jar tomato, onion & basil chunky sauce
• 400 g dried spaghetti
• Basil leaves, to serve

Directions

1. Combine mince, egg, cheese, onion and basil. Season and roll into balls.
2. Heat oil in a large non-stick frying pan. Cook half the meatballs for 4-5 minutes. Remove and repeat.
3. Return the meatballs to the pan and pour over sauce. Cover, cook over a medium heat for 20 minutes until cooked through.
4. Cook spaghetti in a large pan of boiling water, as per packet directions. Drain and place in bowl.
5. Spoon over meatballs and sauce. Serve with basil leaves.

Notes

For a healthy alternative, instead of frying the meatballs, place them on a tray, spray lightly with olive oil spray, and bake in a 180ºC oven until brown. Put the meatballs and their juices in a saucepan with the jar of pasta sauce to finish cooking if necessary (this will depend on the size of your meatballs — I like to make mine small as I find they tend to go further) and to heat the sauce.

Posted by Vicki on Thursday, October 01, 2009 at 07:35 PM in Recipes and Beef and Mediterranean.

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Braised Lamb Neck

This recipe is adapted for the slow cooker from the one in the Winter 2007 edition of Spice magazine, which is one of the few foodie magazines to which I subscribe. Spice has a Slow Food focus and really resonates (I love that word) with me.

To adapt any recipe intended for the oven or stove-top for the slow cooker (or crockpot — same thing) it's important to approximately reduce the liquid by approximately half. It will seem, at first, that there is nowhere near enough — but, believe me, there will be plenty of fluid by the time the meal is ready. If you're not using a slow cooker and instead choose to cook this in a casserole in the oven, I suggest doubling the amount of passata and ensure the stock covers the ingredients in the casserole.

Braised Lamb Neck

Serves 6

Ingredients

• 4 lamb necks, cut across into 3 sections each
• flour
• salt
• pepper, freshly ground
• olive oil
• 1 big onion, finely chopped
• 1 carrot, finely chopped
• 1 cup finely chopped celery
• 1 tablespoon crushed garlic
• 1 cup white wine
• half 690g bottle passata (pureed tomatoes)
• 4 sprigs thyme
• low-salt stock (I used chicken)

Directions

1. Lightly dust the necks with seasoned flour.
2. Heat a shallow covering of olive oil in a heavy pan and brown the neck sections on all sides until golden brown. Place these in a heavy pot.
3. Add the vegetables to the same pan and cook them until they have taken on a little colour. Add these to the pot.
4. Then add the wine, tomatoes, thyme and enough stock to almost cover the ingredients. Season well.
5. Transfer to the slow cooker and cook on low for 8-10 hours (or place in an oven-proof dish and cook, covered, in a 150˚C oven for about two and a half hours) or until they are meltingly tender.
6. Skim off any excess fat and serve with either creamy mashed potatoes or dumplings.

Notes

This dish could also be made with lamb shanks or sections of capretto.

Posted by Vicki on Tuesday, September 22, 2009 at 10:17 AM in Recipes and Lamb and Slow Cooker.

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