Some Kinda Wonderful

Tonight was my only night this week cooking from Mastering the Art of French Cooking. This is bittersweet, as the food tastes amazing, but my heart can't take much more. Or my pants for that matter.
I had decided to make Bifteck Saute Marchand de Vins, or Pan-Broiled Steak with Red Wine Sauce. To go with the steak I was going to make sauteed mushrooms and rice. (Crazy enough, MtAoFC contains recipes for rice).
I realized this was low in vegetable content. So to go with my very French meal I made Greek Salad. In honor of me renting and currently watching My Life in Ruins. (And if anyone has seen My Big Fat Greek Wedding, you might remember this hilarious part "He don't eat no meat? It's ok... I make lamb")

Ok.. Greek Salad. Easy as can be. Cut up a cucumber, a red pepper, a tomato (I used Roma), half a red onion, and a garlic clove. Add some dried basil, extra virgin olive oil, and the juice of half to a whole lemon. And some salt and pepper. You could toss in some olives too, but I don't because I hate them. (Sorry Grandma... strongly dislike them). Of course, no Greek Salad would be complete without feta cheese. And a lot of it. Let this all sit for about a half hour so all the veggies and cheese really pick up the flavor of the lemon and basil.


The steak... I love love love New York Strips. I look for the ones with fat along the side, but not so much in the middle, it's easy then to cut the fat off, and you get a lot of tasty meat. In a skillet, heat up a bit of butter and some oil. The butter is for taste, the oil is to keep it from burning too quick.
For medium rare, which is the correct way to have a steak, saute each side for 3 minutes. NEVER EVER flip the steak too soon. When it hits the hot pan the meat sticks to it, until it caramelizes a little bit and lifts off the pan.
When the 6 minutes are up, remove the steak and place it under foil for 5 minutes so it can rest. Do yourself a favor people, when you cook meat let it REST. If you cut into it right away, all the juices will run out. Let it rest, and the juices redistribute themselves into the meat.

Now drain the fat out of the pan, and add some butter to it. Saute a minced shallot, and then add half a cup of wine. I used red, but you can use white. Let it reduce until it's thick and syrupy. Remove from heat and stir in about 4 tablespoons of butter. Not all at once... add them in small pats.

Earlier on today I wasn't really feeling the rice. Or potatoes, it having been Thanksgiving and all. Since I was making everything with butter already... ravioli with a brown butter and sage sauce it was. However, I do not live near a magical grocery store. Like the ones on TV. Where you can go to a store and get any kind of pasta, or fresh seafood, or hard to find produce. So instead of ravioli I bought tortellini. And instead of remembering to buy sage, I forgot it.
Brown butter sauce is really easy. You melt butter in a pan. Until it turns brown. Hard I know. However, once it turns a golden to amber brown it needs to be removed from the heat. You do not want black butter sauce. Gross.
My favorite part about tonight's meal was the mushrooms. Ok that's not true... my favorite part was the steak. There is nothing better in this world, than a hunk of red meat.
Back to the mushrooms. Up until a week ago I hated mushrooms. I had even tried them three times.
I have a rule, in which everything must be tried three times as it just might have been the preparation that you didn't like, not the actual ingredient.
The trick to making these amazing mushrooms is to get the butter in the pan very hot. The butter is hot when it melts, foams, and the foam subsides a bit. Then place the quartered mushrooms in the hot butter. DO NOT CROWD THE MUSHROOMS! If they are crowded they sweat and steam and become disgusting chewy gross things. If they have room to breathe, they will brown and caramelize and the texture is amazing.
Plus since mushrooms absorb everything they taste like meaty butter. So good.

I tossed the mushrooms into the brown butter for the pasta and mixed it in with the pasta. Then I served the steak with the wine sauce on top.

Now I apologize for my terrible picture taking. Please believe that the food tasted really really
good, and it appears that I have to practice making it look more appetizing in photos...