Tag: steak

The Great Flank Steak Roulade Experiment

I don’t remember exactly why, but for the longest time I’ve wanted to try stuffing and braising a beef flank steak, and this very brociale-like roulade was the result. And while the outside was an unsightly mess of frayed meat fiber, the overall dish was a delicious success.

Braising a flank steak seems counterintuitive since it’s almost always cooked briefly and served medium-rare, but so is top-sirloin, and I’ve used that cut for beef roulade before, and it worked fine. Flank steak is also one of the “beefiest” cuts on a cow, and has a decent amount of fat, so I felt pretty confident going in.

The only thing I hadn’t considered was the appearance, and that ended up being my only real complaint. Because flank steak has such large, pronounced meat fibers, after a few hours of simmering, my roulade had a bad case of split ends. As I mention in the video, we may try and wrap the meat with some type of protective layer, and by protective, I mean fatty.

Other than that, it was a fairly straightforward procedure. Feel free to stuff with anything you like (just not too much), and the same goes for the braising liquid. No matter what you decide to simmer this in, once you’re done, simply reduce it, and use it as a sauce. That means be careful with the salt. I generously salted the roulade, so I didn’t need to heavily season the braising liquid as well. Best to adjust that later.

Anyway, whether you use my specific ingredients or not, I hope you give this technique a try soon. All you need is a flank steak, a sharp, thin knife, and you’re ready to roll. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

1 trimmed beef flank steak, butterflied, and pounded flat (please note: you must cut and roll the meat in the exact way shown, so the grain is going the right way for slicing!)

salt and pepper to taste

1 tbsp black currants

1/4 cup plain breadcrumbs

2 tbsp chopped Italian parsley

1 ounce pancetta, slice into thin strips

2 tbsp finely-grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese

For the braising liquid, I used:

3/4 cup white wine

3 cups tomato sauce

2 cups chicken broth

1 bay leaf

enough water to just cover

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Steak and beans

So this diet, then. I know you want to know about it, even if you have no intention of going on one. I have been a journalist for too long, you see: I believe all that anyone truly cares about are diets and Princess Diana.

I waited until we returned from a blow-out all you can eat bucket and spade holiday in Devon before embarking on my regime: while we were on holiday, I didn’t want to ruin the atmosphere by going on about how I wasn’t eating anything. Then with the cold, dead heart of a Dementor, I imposed a chilling food timetable on myself.

The rules, as mention before, are: no carbs, no sugar, no drinking during the week.

The first three days were simply awful. At one point I was so desperate for sugar (but refused to eat a biscuit) that I strapped Sam into the sling and galloped up to Sainsbury’s for some yoghurt-covered cranberries.

But I also realised in those first three days just how much sugar and snacking went on in my life simply because of the number of times I found myself standing in front of the biscuit tin with no recollection of how I got there.

My daily diet went something like this:

Breakfast: 3 pieces toast, 3 cups tea with sugar
mid-morning: 1/2 bagel (sometimes whole thing?) sugary, full fat latte
post-mid morning: more tea, custard cream?
lunch: nothing
1.30pm: tea, custard cream(s)
1.35pm Kitty’s lunch leftovers, custard cream (cup of tea?)
2.30pm: “balancing” (possibly “fat burning”) diet coke
3pm: some digestive biscuits
5.25pm: Kitty’s leftovers, mini cornetto
7.30pm: dinner – something with rice or pasta
7.50pm: telly and 1/2 bar Lindt “Orange Intense” chocolate (AMAZING)

… and I wondered why my weight was stubbornly at 11 stone. I told myself that I was on the Shitty Food Diet, but the thing about the SFD is that you have to be very busy for it to work. If you are sitting about with a newborn all day long, very close to cupboards full of toddler treats, simply replacing lunch with custard creams doesn’t really cut it.

So now a typical food day looks like this:

Breakfast: punishment museli with banana (yes I know that’s carbs, but barely – and also carbs are free before 8am)
mid-morning: apple
lunch: ham and cheese omelette
teatime snack: diet coke
dinner: 1/2 steak with a soy bean salad

Then after the babies go to bed I go for a 10-min run and do 80 sit-ups.

I know it sounds utterly fucking ghastly, but it’s actually not going too badly. My run is very short, I go slowly and I listen to very loud, very bad music. It is a critical 10 mins alone after a day of listening to other people’s problems, (YOU have to listen to MINE), I get to leave the house, which I don’t do much at the moment and I really think the sit-ups might be doing something.

The thing about diets, the thing you have to do in order to make them work, is to mentally adjust to being okay with feeling quite hungry quite often. A couple of nights of my new regime were spent awake, hungry, with aching legs from the running. I just kept telling myself that hunger is fat leaving the body and the aching legs are just because I haven’t done any exercise for 33 years so of course it’s going to hurt a bit.

Once you get used to feeling hungry, diets are easy. Once you know that being hungry isn’t going to make you faint, or die, you can ignore it. And then your stomach starts shrinking and adjusts to the new amount of food you are eating, and then you’re away.

Diets can often seem anti-food, like food is the enemy. And the things you are allowed to eat when you are on a diet just don’t seem that appealing when you are existing on Planet of Anything-Goes Pregnancy Food Blow-Out.

But – the simplest of lunches and the most punishment of dinners tastes like the best, most fantastic gourmet plateful when you are really, truly hungry.

Not “starving”, you understand. I have become one of those disapproving old biddies who leaps on the use of the word starving as abhorrent and silly when people actually ARE starving in Afghanistan, in Syria – even in parts of this very country.

So if you are actually on a diet, calorie restriction or Atkins or anything, it doesn’t matter much what actual things you are allowed to eat – you will fall on them like a ravenous wolf and scream “WOW THIS IS THE MOST DELICIOUS THING EVER” as you sip some scalding miso soup.

Having said that, I do try to make an effort with dinner. My husband has gamely joined with me on this strict diet and the Lord knows he likes a bit of effort when it comes to food.

The most successful dinner I’ve conjured up recently has been steak and beans. Because I disapprove so massively of eating steak we never have it, but just for the moment I am relaxing and allow us one very expensive organic steak between two of us, accompanied by a soy bean salad and some fried courgettes if I’m feeling really wild.

The secret to the soy bean salad is a dressing made of:

1 handful parsley, finely chopped
5 or so mint leaves, ditto
1 spring onion, chopped
3 tbsp good olive oil
1 tbsp capers, chopped
the juice of one lemon
a sprinkling of chilli flakes (if you like)

You boil the soy beans (available frozen from Waitrose – and many other supermarkets, I’m sure) and then dress them with this sort of salsa thing while still warm.

It really is delicious!! Although I might only be saying that because I am just so hungry.

Fried courgettes, if you are interested, are also nice. Take one courgette, chop it into pieces about 3cm x 1cm long then fry in hot groundnut oil turning occasionally for about 20 mins. They brown up surprisingly nicely. Drain on kitchen roll and sprinkle liberally with sea salt.

Eat all this with an abstemious glass of tap water and remember to work your core muscles while chewing.

Loaded Philly Cheesesteak Baked Potato

Quick skillet steak with onions, peppers and mushrooms are loaded on top of a baked potato and topped with melted cheese – this is awesome and perfect for the meat and potato lover in your life!

I’ve had this idea for a while, and finally made it for dinner to test it out – start to finish this took 20 minutes and it was so good! I used a full fat provolone cheese, because I wanted the cheese to melt nice, after all this is a cheese steak and at 8 points plus for the whole meal I was able to splurge. If you want to use reduced fat, that’s totally up to you, you’ll save 1 point.

Can you do this with sweet potato? Of coarse you can! But I thought russet would pair perfect with the steak and just to clear up
the confusion, white potatoes aren’t all that bad for you. Potatoes are
have gotten a bad rap as a white starchy food, but when they’re not
drowning in butter or deep fried as french fries, they are actually a
healthy, low calorie, high fiber food and a good source of vitamin B6,
vitamin C, copper, potassium and manganese. They also contain a variety
of phytonutrients that have antioxidant activity so if you want to stick
with a traditional baked potato, it’s OK!

Skinny Tip: If you buy bag of russet potatoes, the potatoes are much smaller
than the ones they sell individually, they average about 5 to 6 oz each.

Loaded Philly Cheesesteak Baked Potato
gordon-ramsay-recipe.com
Servings: 4 • Size: 1 potato • Old Points: 8 pts • Points+: 8 pts
Calories: 390 • Fat: 13 g • Protein: 26 g • Carb: 44 g • Fiber: 4 g • Sugar: 3 g
Sodium: 293 mg (without the salt) • Cholesterol: 56 mg

Ingredients:

4 (5 1/2 oz) russet potato, washed and dried
1/2 lb thin sliced beef round sandwich steaks
salt and fresh cracked pepper, to taste
garlic powder, to taste
1/2 medium onion, sliced into long 1/4″ thick strips
1/2 red bell pepper, thinly sliced into 1/4″ thick strips
1/2 green bell pepper, thinly sliced into 1/4″ thick strips
1/2 tsp olive oil
8 oz sliced mushrooms
cooking spray, sprayed about 4 seconds
4 slices provolone cheese

Directions:

Poke holes in the potato with a fork, then cook in the microwave using the baked potato setting until potatoes are soft and cooked through (about 8-10 minutes on high for 4 potatoes). If you don’t have a microwave, bake about 45 minutes at 400°F.

Meanwhile, slice beef into thin strips. Season with salt, garlic powder and fresh pepper to taste. Heat a large skillet over high heat. When the skillet is very hot, spray with cooking spray and add half of the beef. Cook one minute, then turn steak and cook an additional 30 seconds. Set aside in a large dish.

Spray the skillet again and when it gets hot add the remaining steak, cooking one minute, then turning and cooking 30 seconds more. Add remaining steak to the dish.

Return skillet to heat and spray once again with cooking spray; add onions and peppers and season with salt and pepper. Cook one minute, then turn and cook an additional 1 to 2 minutes or until onions are golden. Set aside with steak.

Lower heat to medium and add 1/2 tsp olive oil to the skillet, add mushrooms, salt and pepper and lightly spray the top of the mushrooms with cooking spray. Cook 1 1/2 minutes, then turn mushrooms and cook another minute and a half. Add to dish with steak and onions and stir to combine.

Split the potato in half lengthwise down the middle as I did in the photo then divide the steak and vegetables evenly over each potato and top each with a slice of provolone. Place under the broiler to melt the cheese, careful not to burn.

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