Steak Dinner

This is a beef steak, restaurant-style, full meal, including sides. This is not and should not be an everyday meal, and it's one to make sparingly to treat yourself or impress a guest. This is a big meal, both in work and in quantity. For 2 portions, you will need:

Ingredients for the steaks:

2 steaks (more on that later)
2 sticks of unsalted butter
1 sprig of thyme
1 sprig of rosemary
Salt and pepper (if you freshly grind rock salt and pepper, all the better)
Garlic powder
4 peeled cloves of garlic (for a little more of a kick), or half a black garlic (for a little more of a smokey, tangy taste)
A little olive oil


The most important ingredient here by far are the steaks. If the piece of meat is not good, this will not be a great result for you. You want the steaks to be roughly 250gr each, and thicc. 1 to 1.5 inches thick, to be exact. Thinner than that, the steak will cook faster and most likely overcook by accident, not to mention it won't be as juicy. But more important than the shape is the type of steak.

I personally go for beef, specifically ribeye or new york strip, though I have used the exact same recipe for iberico pork chops, with a slightly adjusted cooking time, and it was quite an enjoyable result. In any case, you will definitely want to pick a tender part of meat. The more white marbling, the better, as that will make your steaks softer, juicier and tastier.

I don't recommend you go too fancy until you've made this recipe a few times and have some experience, then you can go ahead and experiment with fancier steaks like dry aged steaks or wagyu.

Pans and Utensils

A deep pan (cast iron, if you have it, but not required)
A tablespoon
A slotted turner or tongs

Preparation

The execution here is simple in theory, but might be tricky to get right at first.

1) Get all the ingredients ready. This requires taking the raw steaks out of the refridgerator and seasoning them well with salt, pepper and garlic powder, and allowing them to absorb it while slowly warming up to room temperature.

2) Heat the pan with a little bit of olive oil until hot. Then proceed to sear each side of the steaks until dark brown with a nice crust, flipping as much as required, for around 3-4 minutes total.

3) Reduce heat to 2/3, and throw in the butter, thyme, rosemary and garlic. Allow the butter to melt and start getting infused with the flavors of thyme, rosemary and garlic.

4) Use the spoon to continuously bathe the steaks with the melted hot butter for about 5 minutes.

5) Take the steaks out of the pan and let them rest for 15-20 minutes while the residual heat finishes cooking up the inside.

This should end up in beautiful medium rare/medium steaks.

6) Optional: If you want your steaks more medium than medium rare, add 2-3 minutes in stage 4. If you want your steaks medium well or well done (ew), stick them in the oven for 10 minutes, then let them rest. Be warned this will result in less juicy, harder and less tasty steaks.

You can serve as is, or with steak sauce of your choice

For the sides, there's many things you can do, but I tend to go for butter basted asparagus and mashed potato.

You will need:

Asparagus and mashed potato ingredients:

Around 20 asparagus
2 sticks of butter
1/4 cup of hot water
3 cloves of garlic
Salt
1 beef stock cube
4-5 large potatoes
150gr of grated cheddar cheese, extra mature
100gr of chopped spring onion greens
1/4 cup of cooking cream

Pots and utensils:

A large pot
A deep pan
A cutting board
tongs or a wooden spoon
A knife
A bowl

Execution:


1) Peel and quarter the potatoes. Add them in the pot with some salted water and let them boil until soft.

2) Heat the pan, and cut the hard root-side ends of the asparagus off.

3) Crush the garlic with the flat side of the knife, sprinkle salt on it, then finely chop until you have a garlic paste.

4) Add asparagus, garlic and 1 stick of butter in the pan. Turn and flip frequently until they are soft and brownish, at which point they are ready (you will know). Take them off the heat.

5) Dissolve the beef stock cube in the 1/4 cup of hot water.

6) Put the boiled potatoes in the bowl and get mashing.

7) As you mash, sequentially add the beef stock solution, remaining stick of butter, cheese and cream, in this order as to not drop the temperature too quickly, and to allow the butter and cheese to melt.

8) Finally, add the spring onions and mix one last time.

If you've done everything correctly, trust me, salt and pepper will not be required, but you can add some after that if you want. 

Enjoy!