Dinner 28/11/2012 : Beef Steak with Black Pepper Sauce and Herbs served with Salad, Cherry Tomatoes and French Fries

Got home from work late today. Been a very busy week. Went to meet up ***** at Giant. Apparently ***** has already made plans for dinner. ***** asked me to cook this time as ***** wanted beef steaks.

So, there we were looking for the ingredients for tonight's dinner for 2.

BEEF STEAK WITH BLACK PEPPER SAUCE & HERBS & SALADS, CHERRY TOMATOES & FRENCH FRIES.

INGREDIENTS:
- 2 slabs of beef (preferred sirloin, tenderloin or just plain cut beef) but for plain cuts, you'll have to boil it for 30 mins to an hour to tenderize the beef. Don't throw away the water from the boil, it can be used later for the sauce. While the others, you can just use a kitchen mallet and bash away the flesh. I find it therapeutic after a hard day at work. When done, dry the beef with a kitchen towel. .

SEASONING ( a pinch of each)
- Salt (coarse sea salt preferred)
- Grounded Black Pepper
- Powdered White Pepper
- Dried Rosemary
- Dried Basil
- (Optional) Chili Powder. I like mine a bit hot, so i tend to get carried away with the chili powder.

VEGETABLES
You can pretty much use any vegetables you like, but for me, i used
- Red Coral Lettuce
- Baby Butterhead Lettuce
- Green Coral Lettuce
- Cherry tomatoes
- Fine Salt (iodized salt or pink himalayan salt or any that you currently have in your kitchen
- Olive oil (virgin preferred, no pun intended)

SAUCE
- Grounded Black Pepper
- Corn Starch
- Salt
- Sugar
- Thick Soy Sauce
- Garlic Powder
- Onion Powder

OTHERS
- Water
- Butter
- Margerine (optional)
- All Purpose Flour

Or, if you are too lazy like me, you can just get the Maggi - Instant Black Pepper Mix. If Nigella reads this, she's gonna flip!


And of course, french fries. I used crinkle cut fries as it has more body to the potatoes.You can use any that you prefer (i.e wedges, straight cuts and etc)

METHOD:
1) Prepare the beef (see above). Heat up oven at 200ºC. While the oven is heating up, proceed with the next step.. 
2) Rub all the seasoning onto the beef. Make sure to get both sides of the beef.
3) Heat the pan. Pour olive oil. or any cooking oil When hot, turn down the heat to medium heat, throw in some butter (about a table spoon) and let the butter melt.
4) Put the beef in the pan and let it sizzle for 2 minutes a side. Turn over when brown.
5) Turn off the heat, throw in a few cloves of garlic (peeled, also optional). I added these for the taste.
6) Place the pan in the oven and let it cook for another 20 minutes. While the beef is cooking in the over, you can start preparing the salads, sauce and the french fries.
7) Clean the vegetables and spin dry using a salad spinner.
8) Add olive oil (you can mix the virgin olive oil with regular olive oil like what i did, found that it gave a bit more texture and flavor) and salt to taste.
9) Get a sauce pan, pour about 200ml of water and leave it to boil.
10) Then add the sauce ingredients and gently whisk away using a wire wish. Or you can use a fork if it fancies you,
11) Mix together a 2 table spoon of butter (or margarine) & 4 table spoon regular flour in a small mixing bowl to create a paste, Make sure to mix well. This will be a thickening agent for our sauce.
12) Once done, slowly add the thickening agent one table spoon at a time into the sauce pan. Use the wire whisk and whisk well until the all is dissolved. The sauce will be thicker now. (keep adding the thickening agent to get your desired consistency). But remember to keep stirring/whisking to avoid the bottom from being burnt.
13) When ready, put the sauce a side.
14) Take the beef out of the oven. (be sure not to miss this! 20 minutes is more than enough to get a well done, 10 for medium rare)
15) Place everything on a plate to serve.

Enjoy!

PREPARATION TIME : 5mins - 1 Hour
COOKING TIME : 30 Minutes

TOTAL COST: RM 18.40 (serves 2)