Tag: beef

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Food Recipes Tried

2021 Project :: April Beef Stroganoff

This is part of my 2021 project where each month I choose a recipe from the current issue of Bon Appetit and make one of the dishes, trying as hard as I can to do it exactly the way the recipe says. A real challenge for me.

This month I chose Beef Stroganoff from page 22 of the April 2021 issue of Bon Appetit.

A commenter on BA’s website, who didn’t even make the dish complained “This might be beef stroganoff, but there ain’t nothing russian about it.” (yeah, he didn’t even capitalize Russian). The rest of the comments were talking about how rude this guy was. So of course, I was intrigued and I had to look up real Russian “beef stroganov”.

I guess I’m the idiot, I didn’t even know it was a Russian dish, and I have Russian heritage! I think of it as being similar to Swedish Meatballs, so I assumed it was Scandinavian.

Anyway, the commenter said that there should be no tomatoes and should not be served with rice or pasta because they didn’t have wheat in the peasant fields of Russia. Then he spelled “umami” wrong. So take that with a grain of salt.

The “real” recipes I found did have tomato and were served on a starch.

So, I made this and long story short (too late) it was amazing.

Beef Stroganoff

We could not find a one-pound skirt steak only a two-pounder and it was $25! But we bought it and Greg cut it in two, saving one pound for later.

Here’s the prep for it. I chose to get everything ready in advance (mis en place).

Prep for Beef Stroganoff
Prep for Beef Stroganoff

For this recipe you cook the meat whole, let it rest, and cut it into strips at the end just before you put it back in the sauce to warm it up. Or in our case, cook it through. Haha, mine ended up a little rare, even though I cooked it the time allotted per side (yes, I even timed it…with a timer!)

beef steak in pan
cooking the beef

These mushrooms were amazing.

bowl of mushrooms
these were so so good

I served this with steamed broccoli.

bowl of broccoli
side of steamed broccoli

Look at that beautiful sauce.

Beef Stroganoff in pan

This was a winner!

Beef Stroganoff final plate
Tada! Dig in!!
Categories
Experiments Food Recipes Tried

Dinner :: Chef John’s Salisbury Steak

One night when my husband and I were watching TV a conversation came up on Salisbury Steak. I think he said he didn’t like it, and I said I loved it and would make a good one for him to prove it.

However, my bravado wrote a check that my skills couldn’t cash. My favorite Salisbury Steak is this one.

Swansons TV dinner from the 70s

Those silky potatoes and that chocolate cake was sooo good, even when it burned a little. But the steaks were so tasty and that gravy!? *Swoon*

Also, I used to work at a place that provided lunch for staff and their Salisbury Steak was the BOMB! They didn’t make it in house, it was from a food service company. So it was like school lunch, but better.

[Update] I just found out that the food we were served at work was…..{drum roll please…} STOUFFERS!! ]

So I did some digging and I already had a few Salisbury recipes in my cookbook (I use CopyMeThat). The one that had the most stars (given by me) was the one from Home Chef. Here’s how it came out when I made it then:

HomeChef Salisbury Steak
Home Chef Salisbury Steak

The sauce looks too creamy and light colored for what I wanted.

So, I kept looking. When I Googled it, I realized that Chef John from Food Wishes had a recipe. So I watched the video again and decided to use this one.

Mushrooms and onions sauteing

I did make the meat ahead and let it rest in the refrigerator, as suggested. What I didn’t love is the ketchup. Something in it felt not quite right and I think it’s the ketchup. He does say in the video that his recipe is more like meatloaf and I guess I don’t really like that aspect. If I want meatloaf I’ll just make that.

Salisbury Steak
Finished Salisbury Steak

This was good, but I think the Home Chef one was better.  Note, there are 2 HC Salisbury recipes, one is “steak” and the other one is meatballs. I liked them both and rated them both 4 stars, but they are different.

Maybe I have to take things from all three of these recipes and make one of my own with them as guides.

What’s your favorite recipe for Salisbury Steak?

Salisbury Steak
Bonus photo, Salisbury Steak

The beef, mushrooms, and beans were from Imperfect Foods. Use my link and get $10 off your first box. (Full disclosure, I get $10 off too.)

Categories
Food Meal kits Reviews

Dinner :: Beef Banh Mi Bowls

Tonight I made the Beef Banh Mi Bowls from EveryPlate. EveryPlate is the budget-conscious little sister of Hello Fresh. The meals are usually pretty good, and far less expensive than any other meal kit that I have tried.

Part of why it is so inexpensive is that they don’t give you all the ingredients. In an upcoming meal I have, there are 7 ingredients listed that you ‘must have on hand’. I totally get providing my own salt, pepper and oil. But this one needed me to have on hand: Salt, Pepper, Ketchup, Butter, Sugar, Vegetable Oil and eggs.

But that’s another meal that I’ll be making for lunch next week. This one provided everything but salt, pepper, oil, butter and sugar(which I barely even used).
Ingredients for Banh Mi Bowl
This is the second time I’ve made this and I really wish I’d read my notes on time #1 because there I noted there was much too much carrot. Well, since I *didn’t* read that, there was this time too! Funny, how that works.

This is one of the best ones from EveryPlate in my opinion. I’ve never had anything terrible from there, but certainly there have been ones that were just unremarkable. This one is pretty good though, since I’ve ordered it twice!

I did not use the full amount of sugar as I’m trying to limit that, and I don’t like sweetness in savory dishes (though I love salt in sweet dishes. I’m weird).

Here’s the finished product. This time I served them with pot stickers (frozen) that I steamed in the Instant Pot.

Beef Banh Mi Bowl

I should have used larger bowls like I did the first time.

Beef Banh Mi Bowl

Try EveryPlate here.

Categories
Meal kits

Dinner :: Mongolian Beef and Noodles

Tonight I made the Mongolian Beef & Noodles from Blue Apron.

meal kit prep

This was…fine. I just had such high hopes. This sounded so good and it was just bland. I ended up adding salt, pepper and soy sauce to the  dish while eating it, and it still just tasted like cornstarch. It was almost gummy.

So I would probably not order this kit again, but I may make it again. I would just use way less cornstarch and add some more flavoring to the meat before cooking. Maybe that would help.

Anyway, I made a short video if you want to see it.

But here’s the end result.

Mongolian Beef Dish