Steaks on the Barbie
The banishment has been lifted! I'm allowed back in the kitchen!
To celebrate, I made a really simple meal - steaks, mashed potatoes, and peas. And I hardly made any mess. Well... just two pots and two skillets. And spoons and tongs and a potato masher and that sort of stuff. For me, it was hardly any mess, at all - and I didn't dirty the stove!
I started the steaks on the grill and finished them off in the oven - and then topped them with sauteed onions and mushrooms finished in brandy. The mashed potatoes had lots of cheese in them. The fresh peas just had a bit of butter. One needs to watch one's calories, after all...
A simple meal in preparation for the Blizzard of '18 due to start in a few hours. The weather folks are now calling for 3"-5" at our house. I'm still saying maybe a dusting. They're hyping it so much I just don't see it coming inland here. And if I'm wrong - I just hope we don't lose power. Victor and I can - and have - gone days without electricity. His mom is another story. The thought is too awful to contemplate.
So here's to a bust of a storm and electricity!
Brisket
I didn't have a Jewish Bubbe to teach me how to cook a brisket and the briskets of my Irish youth were usually corned and served on various days of the year, but most notably on my Grandfather's birthday - March 17th.
I'm sure we had a non-corned brisket now and again, but I don't remember anything unusual or spectacular about them. Just another meal for the six kids...
Leon's BBQ down the street from us as kids had an amazing brisket sandwich. He did the whole mop and sauce thing over wood fire. Real BBQ in San Francisco. The place was known for miles around.
My first real memory of cooking brisket comes courtesy of Uncle Sam's Yacht Club. Uncle Sam provided us with whole briskets in the 20 pound range. Untrimmed. A cursory trimming would ensue - in Navy jargon that means it came out of the box and into the pan untouched - and then into low ovens for hours on end with water, beef bouillon, onions, garlic, and whatever other spices could be found. They made a damned good brisket. Really. It's not just looking at the past through rose colored glasses. Uncle Sam did have some pretty good food. They had some pretty bad food, as well. Brisket was not one of them.
Back into civilian life with my tastebuds expanded after traveling around the world and working in restaurants that served more than American versions of Italian food, I got to learn a bit more about the hows and whys of braising large cuts of meat - and why you really shouldn't be trimming all that fat off if you want it tender and to taste good. The Navy had it right.
And here we are, today, all these years later, with a 2 pound brisket I picked up at Reading Terminal Market, yesterday, with the proper amount of fat cap.
I started off early this morning by making a spice rub and letting the meat sit out for an hour or so and then it went into the braising pan and into the oven at 225°F for about 5 hours or so.
Rather good.
Oven-Braised Brisket
Spice Rub:
- Brown Sugar
- Chile Powder
- Cumin
- Cayenne Pepper
- Garlic Powder
- Salt & Pepper
Braising Ingredients:
- Beef Broth
- Ketchup
- Apple Cider Vinegar
- Worcestershire Sauce
- Thick-Sliced Tomatoes
Mix spices together and coat brisket liberally. Let sit out about an hour for flavors to penetrate.
In a bowl, mix together equal parts beef broth & catsup, half as much vinegar and a few good shots of worcestershire sauce. Pour over meat and top with thick slices of tomato. Cover and place in oven about 5 hours at 225°F. Add potatoes at the 4 hour mark.
Remove meat, raise temperature to 400°F, and let the potatoes and tomatoes continue cooking another 30 minutes while the meat rests.
While the meat was resting, I started frying off some hot Italian peppers. I got them cleaned and into the skillet, and Victor took over cooking them.
I sliced up some slabs of crusty bread and we ate well. Really well.
Crusty bread with fork-tender beef, a bit of stewed tomato, and fried hot pepper is something everyone should experience.
Really.
Holiday Hamburgers
Baking bread on hot, muggy days may seem counter-intuitive, but Mother Nature's Outdoor Proofing Box is just too good to pass up. I get such a great rise from the dough, it's worth having the air conditioning on.
I have been making this particular bread since first seeing the recipe in Bon Appetit a few years ago. I've made it as dinner rolls and pull-apart bread loaves. This is my first foray into burger buns - and from the taste of things, it shan't be my last.
It's a bit different in its preparation, in that you start off by cooking a bit of flour and water together. I know there's a scientific reason for doing so, but I'm dragging my food-chemistry days behind me. Suffice to say that the butter, eggs, and heavy cream make for a very tender crumb.
Milk Bead
Ingredients
- 5⅓ cups bread flour, divided
- 1 cup heavy cream
- ⅓ cup mild honey
- 3 tablespoons nonfat dry milk powder
- 2 tablespoons active dry yeast
- 2 tablespoons kosher salt
- 3 large eggs
- 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into pieces, room temperature
- Flaky sea salt, sesame seeds, poppy seeds, or other toppings, optional
Preparation
Cook ⅓ cup flour and 1 cup water in a small saucepan over medium heat, whisking constantly, until a thick paste forms (almost like a roux but looser), about 5 minutes. Add cream and honey and cook, whisking to blend, until honey dissolves. Cool to no more than 110°F.
Transfer mixture to the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with a dough hook and add milk powder, yeast, kosher salt, 2 eggs, and 5 cups flour. Knead on medium speed until dough is smooth, about 5 minutes.
Add butter, a piece at a time, fully incorporating into dough before adding the next piece, until dough is smooth, shiny, and elastic, about 4 minutes.
Coat a large bowl with nonstick spray and transfer dough to bowl, turning to coat. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm, draft-free place until doubled in size, about 1 hour.
If making rolls, lightly coat a 6-cup jumbo muffin pan with nonstick spray. Turn out dough onto a floured surface and divide into 6 pieces. Divide each piece into 4 smaller pieces (you should have 24 total). They don’t need to be exact; just eyeball it. Place 4 pieces of dough side-by-side in each muffin cup.
If making a loaf, lightly coat a 9x5" loaf pan with nonstick spray. Turn out dough onto a floured surface and divide into 6 pieces. Nestle pieces side-by-side to create 2 rows down length of pan.
If making split-top buns, lightly coat two 13x9" baking dishes with nonstick spray. Divide dough into 12 pieces and shape each into a 4"-long log. Place 6 logs in a row down length of each dish.
Let shaped dough rise in a warm, draft-free place until doubled in size (dough should be just puffing over top of pan), about 1 hour.Preheat oven to 375°. Beat remaining egg with 1 tsp. water in a small bowl to blend. Brush top of dough with egg wash and sprinkle with sea salt or other seasonings, if desired. Bake, rotating pan halfway through, until bread is deep golden brown, starting to pull away from the sides of the pan, and is baked through, 25–35 minutes for rolls, 50–60 minutes for loaf, or 30–40 minutes for buns. If making buns, slice each bun down the middle deep enough to create a split-top.
Let milk bread cool slightly in pan on a wire rack before turning out; let cool completely.
The burgers were basic ground beef with bacon, red onion, lettuce, pickles, mayonnaise, catsup, and roquefort cheese, along with a generous helping of Mom's Potato Salad.
The Holiday Weekend is off to a good start!
Sloppy Joe's and Dirty Potatoes
My original plan for dinner, tonight, was either split pea or lentil soup. I bought a ham last week because it was ridiculously inexpensive and cooked it up last night.
I have had - and cooked - many hams over the years. I can appreciate a really good ham, but a cheap ham has its place, too. With just a bit of patience, just about anyone can turn a supermarket freebie into a holiday centerpiece. Low and slow without a lot of extraneous stuff - a few cloves stuck in should suffice.
And I like unsliced hams. I'm not a fan of spiral-cut hams for a couple of reasons... First, have you ever had one that was actually cut properly? And second - they dry out. HoneyBaked Hams - the supposed Cadillac of Hams - are pretty sad, in my not so humble opinion. Not to mention, ridiculously expensive.
But, wait... this is supposed to be about sloppy joe's - not ham. Focus!!
But focusing is difficult when you're writing on the laptop in the back yard in gorgeous 78°F (that's about 26°C for the rest of the world) weather. Today just wasn't soup weather.
So Sloppy Joe's moved from lunch to dinner and dirty potatoes replaced the fries. Ham and bone are vacuum-packed and frozen for another day.
Dirty Potatoes is a Pop recipe. He was a pretty good cook in his own right and actually enjoyed getting into the kitchen now and again. Breaded Veal Cutlets, Dirty Potatoes, and Apple Cole Slaw will always be my Pop-In-The-Kitchen memory. Along with his eggs fried in an inch of bacon grease, of course. Damn, they were good. And french bread toast. Can't forget the toast.
It's amazing that so many of my fond memories of life revolve around food.
Pop's recipe for his Dirty Potatoes is pretty straightforward - he wrote it out for a Family Reunion Cook Book circa 1996:
Peel at least 2 potatoes per person.
Cut longways in fours (or sixes for large potatoes). Put in large cake pan. Oil all sides of spuds. Put in oven at high heat and keep checking until crispy on outside. Keep turning till all sides are brown like french fries.
His idea of a "large cake pan" was a 9x13 pyrex pan. I'm a sheet pan person, m'self... and I'm sure those "two potatoes per person" harken to his firehouse cooking days - and the 10 lb bags of russets we got - mostly small potatoes for a cheaper price.
The sloppy joe's were just onion and bell pepper sauteed in a bit of oil, ground beef added, along with a bit of cumin, chili powder, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Then some tomato paste and a bit of water to thin.
Really simple, really basic, and perfect for a sunny spring day.
Sunday Pot Roast
These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands by it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.
--Thomas Paine, 1776
An odd way to start a food blog, perhaps. But then, perhaps not.
44 years ago, yesterday, I was standing on the flight deck of the USS Ranger CVA-61, grilling steaks in the middle of the Gulf of Tonkin. I was a cookin' fool even back then.
The Viet Nam Peace Accords had been signed and we were - technically - no longer at war. There were 5000 really happy guys on that ship - no more war meant being able to go home. No more fighting. No more killing.
If you've never been in a war zone it's kinda hard to understand the stress and the strife. I was lucky. I didn't have to go traipsing through the jungle with a gun. But supporting the war effort is still no picnic. I worked 12 hours on, 12 hours off, seven days a week. It was disgustingly hot - both in the bakeshop where I was assigned - and in our berthing area where we slept stacked three high.
We had it easy. We weren't being bombed. Our homes weren't being destroyed. Our babies weren't being killed.
It would be a couple more years before the fall of Saigon and our evacuation of Vietnamese refugees.
We flew thousands of people from rooftops to Navy ships in the Tonkin Gulf. Navy ships picked up thousands more in the waters off the coast. They came to the United States under The Indochina Migration and Refugee Assistance Act signed by President Gerald Ford. Under this act, approximately 130,000 refugees from South Viet Nam, Laos and Cambodia were allowed to enter the United States under a special status, and the act allotted for special relocation aid and financial assistance.
130,000 refugees. 1975. And in 2017, people are screaming about how we can't handle 10,000 refugees from Syria. We gave 130,000 people relocation aid and financial assistance, but somehow, our vast country can't handle 10,000 people from the most war-ravaged place on the planet. The hypocrisy is mind boggling.
A side note from that grilling day on the Ranger... I got 2nd degree sunburn over every exposed part of my body and was hospitalized overnight and then limited duty until we pulled into Hong Kong for Chinese New Year.
One thing that will always stick with me is how well I was treated in every country I was in. There was no animosity from anyone being a white kid in a brown land. People were friendly, the languages were music, the food was exotic and fascinating. I was the outsider who was always made to feel at home. I watched, I listened, I learned.
And what I learned most is that we are the same. We all have the same basic needs. We need to breathe, we need to eat, we need to laugh, we need to love.
This is why I stand in defiance of the Trump administration and their banning of refugees and citizens of select Muslim countries - while simultaneously NOT blocking people from countries where he has financial interests.
I did not go to war 45 years ago to watch this country turn her back on people in need. I did not go to war to see Mexico scapegoated. I did not go to war to see walls built where we should be tearing them down.
It's hard to leave the house to go out and protest when there's a 91 year old living with you. It's frustrating, because the 16 year old who got tear-gassed at SF State in 1968, who burned his draft card (and paid for that move in boot camp) wants to be in the middle of the fray.
Instead, I cook. I bake. I send money to the ACLU and am calling my representatives daily. Yes, daily. I don't always get through and often the voicemail boxes are full - but I'm calling them. Every day.
And thinking of all of those fabulous meals I ate overseas. Because the more you expand your culinary horizons, the more you expand your mind. The more you understand that we really are the same. We take the same foods and put them together differently - and it's all good.
Tonight was a pot roast of indeterminable origin.
Fuck you, Trump.
Gatò di Patate and Veggies from the Garden
Our friend George, in Sicily, has a lot of recipes on his website - very basic, simple Sicilian fare. It's the type of cooking that doesn't require a lot because the few ingredients used are quality. It's something we have lost with our factory farms and produce being shipped from six of the seven continents year-round.
We have whole generations, now, who will never get to experience the joy of eating those first ripe strawberries of the season. Or the anticipation of that first watermelon - and seeing how far you could spit the seeds. It's too bad... We have so much and take it all for granted.
While I have always been a farmer's market kinda guy - and do love exotic fruits and vegetables from around the world - I'm really really enjoying walking out into the back yard and picking vegetables for dinner. I know I've come late to the party - but at least I've shown up. It's proving that you're never too old to learn.
The first dish tonight, was George's Gatò di Patate. I thought the interesting thing about this is George says the gatò should be served cold! I served it hot right out of the oven and loved it. And, I imagine it would make a great cold side-dish. I'll taste the leftovers tomorrow and let you know my thoughts on it being served cold.
It takes a few pots and pans to get it all together, but it's definitely worth the effort!
I made it in a round casserole, but I think if I was to serve it cold I'd make it in a 9x13 pan. Cut in squares.
- 1 kg of potatoes
- 80 g of butter
- 3 egg yolks
- 2 egg whites
- 80 g of salami
- 80 g of cooked ham
- 100 g of parmesan cheese
- 250 g of provola and mozzarella cheese
- salt & pepper
- breadcrumbs
- suet
- parsley
Boil the potatoes, remove the peel and mash.
Add the butter, Parmesan cheese, egg yolks, the egg whites, crumbled salami and ham, parsley, salt and pepper. Mix everything well.
Grease with lard (suet) a saucepan, sprinkle the breadcrumbs and put between two layers of cream of potato the mozzarella into pieces and the provola cheese.
With a wooden spoon lined surface smooth. Bake at high heat and remove when golden.
The Gatò should be served cold.
The measurements are in metric because the whole entire world uses the metric system - except us. I remember 28 grams to the ounce from my cocaine-snorting days, so the conversions are pretty easy.
I used speck and pancetta in place of the salami and ham, and a blend of asiago, mozzarella, and fontina for the provolo and mozzarella. That's not a typo. The cheese he is using is a Sicilian cows milk cheese called provolo - not provolone. Use another Italian cheese - you're not going to find it locally.
Nonna cleaned her plate. She ate every single bit of it and commented on how much she liked it.
The squash came from the yard. Victor's never been a huge fan of the summer squashes - but he is now that we're growing our own! It really is a different product that the stuff you get in the store.
All I did with this was saute a bit of onion in butter, add the cubed squash and let it cook a bit, toss in a chopped tomato, and some fresh basil, salt, and pepper. Quick, easy, and oh, so good!
That was the last purchased tomato of the season. We are about to get bombarded with them. The plan is to just gather them up and make sauce and can it - over and over until fall and no more tomatoes are left. Plus the normal tomato salad drizzled with our Sicilian olive oil.
The answer to the question will you still need me, will you still feed me when I'm sixty-four? is a resounding, YES.
I'm enjoying this!
Steaks on the Grill
A couple of days ago it was snowing and I was making soup. Today it's sunshine and blue skies - and I'm grilling steaks. Gotta love Spring in the Mid-Atlantic States.
Today really was perfect weather. Sunny and 70°F - give or take. Warm in the sun and cool in the shade. Great for a bit of yard work. I didn't do any, but if I had, it would have been the perfect weather to do it. As it was, it was pretty much the perfect weather not to do anything - something I'm very good at.
Dinner was a rough one... I hit the steaks with salt and pepper and put them on the grill. When they were perfectly rare, I pulled them off and drizzled olive oil on them - just like they did with the Bistecca alla Fiorentina we had in Florence a few years ago.
Our waiter was a cutie and after dinner for 7 people with drinks and desserts all around, I think we tipped him something like €75. He was shocked, said, no, it was too much... It was our last night in Italy - we didn't care. It was a great dinner and he was a lot of fun.
Speaking of a lot of fun... we really do need to get back over there.
Next year, for sure!
In the meantime, we'll keep cooking up memories and keep making plans for more...
Australian Garlic Salt
Through the miracle of Facebook, I was online-talking a couple of weeks ago with a cousin who lives in Australia. Kathryn and I have never actually met in person but were introduced through other cousins from Omaha. She is originally an Omaha girl but has lived down under for quite some time. In typical family-fashion, we've become fast friends.
I've never been to Australia. I came close - Singapore and then through the Java sea when in Uncle Sam's Yacht Club - but that other-side-of-the-world-flight-as-a-civilian has eluded me, thus far. However... I'm thinking that the trip may just be worth it one of these days!
We were chatting about food - how unusual is that?!? - when she mentioned some garlic salts she had gotten from a place south of Melbourne - Otway Fields - and said she'd send me a couple of packets.
Yesterday, the packets arrived!
What fun to get local food from 17000 kilometers away! You should see it! After opening the packet, the salt sparkled. I wish the picture could capture the way the light was reflecting off the crystals. It really did look magical.
And the flavor... WOW! The Black Garlic has really been tamed by the long cooking - 40 days of heating - but the flavor is intense. Not garlic as you expect, but a rich, deep, earthy flavor that is really unique. The Smoked Garlic Salt has a stronger garlic flavor with a smoky undercurrent. Another unique flavor. As you may know, I'm a bit of a spice junkie. I think there are close to 50 different herbs and spices in the cabinet and 13 or so different salts. Well... 15, now. They're all there for a reason and they now have some excellent company. They have both put a smile on my face!
I coated a tri-tip roast quite liberally with the black garlic salt and tossed it on the barbie - and it came out divine!
I didn't add any other spices or seasonings - I wanted to see how it would fare on its own - and it passed the test with flying colors.
I think the next dish may be potato salad. The flavors would be perfect. And I still have to try the smoked garlic salt. That one definitely has a garlic kick to it - and a smokiness that may be calling for a piece of white fish of some sort... We shall see.
In the meantime, we had a great dinner and the joy of more to come!
Thanks, Kathryn!!!
Memorial Day 2015
Memorial Day. The official start of summer and the day people get confused with Veterans Day and Armed Forces Day.
As an actual live veteran, it's always a bit disconcerting when people thank me for my service, today. (I don't really like being thanked for my involvement in Viet Nam on any day - but that's another story for another time.)
Today is the day that is set aside for remembering those who died in service to our country. Those who came back in flag-draped coffins - if they were lucky - and those who are buried in Gettysburg, Flanders Fields, along the road to Bataan, Korea, Viet Nam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Beirut, the bottom of every ocean on the planet... It's an endless list.
1,400,000 Americans have been killed in wars since our country was founded. One Million, Four Hundred Thousand. Dead.From.War.
The day to thank Veterans like myself who came home alive, is Veteran's Day - November 11th. It was originally Armistice Day - the day WWI ended. That was the war to end all wars. It is celebrated with Veterans Day Sales since it's too cold to BBQ.
That would also be the day to thank the 1,500,000 wounded veterans and the day to kick yourself for voting for that Congressman or Senator who keeps voting to cut Veteran's benefits while simultaneously pushing to go to war somewhere else. Yes, your vote counts.
The day to thank active duty military is Armed Forces Day - the third Saturday in May. Not many people know about this day because it's on a Saturday and no one gets the day off.
It was on May 15th this year. It will be May 21st, next year. Mark your calendars.
So, on this Memorial Day, I toasted a couple of guys I knew who didn't make it back from Viet Nam, and cooked a couple of steaks, a couple ears of corn - with chipotle butter - and potato salad, tomato salad, and watermelon. And a Coca-Cola from Mexico. You can really taste the difference.
Peach bars are gonna be cut for dessert in a while. I may be a left-leaning Liberal but I can still take part in American Traditions.
And something to ponder while you're eating that burger or hot dog, or whatever...
Think about who profits from war. Think about how much money we spend every day on bombs and guns and our own weapons of mass destruction. And then think about why we don't have any money to fix crumbling bridges or educate our children.
And think about how many more young lives we're going to extinguish between now and Monday, May 30, 2016 - Memorial Day, next year.
We, The People could put a stop to it if we all started paying attention.
Tri-Tip on the Grill
One of my mostest-favoritest things to grill are tri-tip roasts. Tri-tips are really a west coast cut of meat, although they are finally showing up on the eastern seaboard. Tender, juicy, and lots and lots of flavor.
I did a fairly standard take on a Santa Maria rub and then brushed it with a mustard and vinegar sauce while it was grilling. It came out spicy-good. At the last minute I realized Nonna wasn't going to go for either the beans or the beef, so she got a chicken cutlet.
The beans were Phoebe's famous baked beans - the only ones I've made for years, now... And french fries because I didn't feel like going to the store just for a couple of potatoes. I'm lazy like that...
Phoebe's Baked Beans
- 1/2 cup minced shallots
- 1 tablespoon ground cumin
- 1 tablespoon minced garlic
- 1/2 cup tomato puree (I use tomato paste – I never have puree in the house!)
- 1 tablespoon canola oil
- 1/4 cup honey
- 1/4 cup cider vinegar
- 2 tablespoons molasses
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 2 chipotle chiles, canned in adobo sauce, seeded and chopped
- 2 (28-ounce) cans baked beans
Preheat oven to 300°.
Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add shallots; sauté 4 minutes or until golden. Add cumin and garlic; sauté for 1 minute. Add tomato puree and oil, and cook for 2 minutes or until thick, stirring constantly. Add remaining ingredients (except beans.). Reduce heat; simmer for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Combine beans and shallot mixture in a 2-quart baking dish. Bake at 300° for 1 hour or until thick and bubbly.
And the rub and marinade...
Tri Tip Spice Rub
- 2 tsp garlic powder
- 2 tsp kosher salt
- 2 tsp black pepper
- 1 1/2 tsp smoked paprika
- 1 tsp onion powder
- 1 tsp celery seed
- 1 tsp dried rosemary
- 1/4 tsp Guamanian boonie pepper (or cayenne)
Mix all ingredients together and rub liberally on tri tip roast. Cover and let stand in refrigerator about 4 hours.
Grilling Sauce
- 1/3 cup red wine vinegar
- 1/3 cup neutral oil
- 1/2 tsp dijon mustard
Brush on roast while it is grilling, turning every 4 or 5 minutes and applying more.
It came out spicy-good. And it's going to make some great sandwiches tomorrow!
A Tenderloin of Beef
There's something oddly decadent about putting BBQ sauce on a filet mignon steak. I mean... a filet is the ultimate. It may get wrapped in bacon or topped with Bearnaise Sauce, but BBQ Sauce?!?Quelle horreur!!
Then, again, I was using a Sriracha BBQ Sauce. The stuff rocks the Casaba!
The filets came about because I was at the grocery store pricing meats and realizing I could buy a whole tenderloin of beef for what they were asking for a few steaks and burger. I have a knife. I can cut something into pieces.
The first thing I did was clean up the tenderloin and rem,ove the chain. There's some good meat on that little piece, but it's not steak material.
Second thing was to cut some steaks.
I got 15 steaks from the tenderloin, so they ended up costing me about 5 bucks a piece.
They're like anything else you buy, nowadays. The more someone touches it, the more you're going to pay for it. You seriously pay for that perceived convenience. It probably took me 20 minutes to clean, cut, and vacuum-seal the steaks. But even if it had taken an hour, I still came out ahead. The store will charge $10 to $15 a piece for those same steaks - and they won't be as nicely trimmed!
Think about it the next time you're at the store.
I bought a whole pork loin, too. I have 15 thick-cut pork chops that cost me a buck a piece. I didn't take any pictures of those, but suffice to say, we're going to be eating well. And on the cheap!
Beef Braised in Guinness
It's that time of year...
Corned Beef and Cabbage. You know... that not-really-from-Ireland-Irish meal that gets served with enough green beer to rival the River Shannon.
The first, last, and only time I have ever had green beer was back in the '60s when I worked at Pirros. Barry - the owner - got a keg of the stuff one St Paddy's Day. It wasn't even good beer - probably Burgie. We also dyed the pizza dough green and made green pizzas. It pretty much freaked people out. The upside was there was a bar across the street called The Leprechaun Saloon and we kept bringing over green pepperoni pizzas for the crowd and received numerous - as in numerous - shots of Jameson's in return. I think we finished off the keg with a couple of off-duty cops from Taraval Station around 3am. I may have been 18 at the time... Not my most inebriated St Paddy's Day, but in the Top 10. The most - or worst - was probably when I took an Irish coworker from Chicago - Sean Hennigan - on a pub crawl in San Francisco. The following day hangover was epic.
As kids, we always had Corned Beef and Cabbage on St Paddy's Day. Pop would head down to the Mission and get big ol' corned briskets fresh from the butcher. The kind of place where the guy would roll up his sleeve and stick his hand in the barrel and grab a good one right in front of you. He'd get them a couple of times a year, but the one on St Paddy's was always special.
As a pre-teen, I tap-danced my way up Market Street as part of the Anne Healy Irish Dancers, and for several years serenaded shoppers at Fairlane Market in a quartet with other boys from ukulele and choir. And had corned beef when I got home.
I ate Corned Beef and Cabbage off the coast of Viet Nam and in Irish bars from Boston to Buffalo, Atlanta to Portland. And I cooked more than a few, m'self.
But all that Corned Beef and Cabbage went away when I met Victor. Victor doesn't like cabbage. He has other redeeming qualities, so it's not difficult to forsake one yearly meal, but it is funny to think about how few times I've had it in the past 20 years compared to how many times I had it the previous 20.
We had five or six of my dad's cousin's over for a St Paddy'd Day dinner back around 1996 or so and we wanted to do something a bit different - and not smell up the house with cooking cabbage. I came up with this based on something I had read in a magazine.
It's been a staple every year, since, and I really don't miss the cabbage with the corned beef. If anything, I miss it in soup. I will cook a corned beef now and again, and Victor has made me Stuffed Cabbage in the past, so it's not like I'm sitting here deprived.
Yeah right. Me. Deprived. As if...
But I digress... I usually make a Barmbrack to go along with it but I have lots of yesterday's Onion and Poppy Seed bread left over... so I eschewed it this year.
Beef Braised in Guinness
- 2 pounds beef steak, cut in pieces
- 3 medium onions, sliced
- 1 pound carrots, sliced into sticks
- 2 pounds small red or yellow potatoes, left whole
- all-purpose flour
- Salt and pepper
- Garlic powder
- 3 tbsp butter
- 1 tsp basil
- 1 bottle Guinness
- 2 tbsp honey
- 1 cup beef broth
Cut the meat into serving sizes. Pound them to tenderize and for a uniform thickness. Peel the onions and slice. Peel the carrots and slice them into sticks. Wash the potatoes but leave them whole.
Place the flour in a dish and mix in 1 tsp of salt, pepper, and a bit of garlic powder. Heat the butter in a sautè pan, add the onions and cook until soft. Transfer them to a large, shallow, greased ovenproof dish.
Dredge the pieces of meat in the seasoned flour and brown. Remove as they are cooked and place on top of the onions in a single layer.
Add a little more butter to the pan and stir in some of the seasoned flour to make a roux. Cook for a minute or two, stirring constantly and scraping up all the browned bits then add the Guinness. Allow to boil for a minute or two, then add the basil, honey and the broth. Return to a boil and pour over the meat. Cover the dish and bake at 325° for about an hour.
Remove from oven, add potatoes and carrots, cover, and return to the oven for another hour.
A fun meal and ya won't stink up the house with the smell of cabbage! And there's time to make it tomorrow!
Beannachtam na Femle Padraig
(Happy St Patrick's Day)