Friday Night Menu, Grass Fed Dry Aged Steak, July 8,2011

I am back after skipping two Friday Night dinners in a row. We were in Naples Florida for ten days. We bought a second home that we will use for vacations and renting out. The last thing on my mind was coming up with creative food ideas these past couple weeks, my mind was instead filled with paint colors and decorateing rooms. So Wednesday night was here and then I realized I hadn't planned my Friday night menu yet "Oh No!" So at 8;30pm I turned on the tv for some ideas. We watched "the best thing I ever ate" and a half hour later I had the menu, so now I could go to bed (we live in the woods so it's much easier to get all ingredients on my way home from work on Thursday).

Tapenade Crisps

This was actually not from watching TV that night, it was something I read in Laura Calder's book and so I kind of had this idea already. Her recipe in the book was Tapenade which I have made many times. In her introduction to this recipe she talks about a few ways to use this tapenade, and one of the ways was this way. I thought why didn't I ever think of that. Tapenade is a combination of Calamata olives, capers, anchovies, lemon juice, olive oil and pepper. It's all blended together to a paste and there are slight variations like mine is made without anchovies. So once you make that paste you mix together 1 cup tapenade, 3/4 cup all purpose flour and 2 tsp of lightly beaten egg whites. Once you get a smooth paste you spread it out onto a Silpat, grate on some parmesana reggiano and bake in a pre-heated 375 degree oven. She says it takes 10-12 minutes but I put them back in for another 10 minutes. These were great with drinks...the two of us ate the whole batch...

Grass Fed, Dry Aged, NY Strip Steak

So this was one out of three of the ideas I got from watching “The best thing I ever ate”.  It was the “Old school” episode and Alex Guarnaschelli was raving about the aged strip steak from a restaurant in Tampa Florida called Bern’s Steak House.  Its aged 5 weeks and they grill it with butter, salt and pepper.  I love strip steak and I was intrigued by the idea of using butter instead of olive oil (which is what I always do).  So I got the “oldest” steak at Whole Foods which was dry aged for 3 weeks.  I made some clarified butter and when I was ready to grill it I just brushed on the butter, salt and pepper.  As always I bring the steak closer to room temperature by just removing it from the refrigerator an hour or two before grilling.  I really liked the use of butter, I think it made a crispier crust and it had a buttery flavor.

Frites with Béarnaise Sauce

This was the second Idea from the food show.  It was John Besh’s best thing and it was Pommes Soufflé or Souffléd Potatoes.  I didn’t do the soufflé part but the way they serve these at Galatorie’s restaurant in New Orleans is with béarnaise sauce.  I decided to just roast “fries” by cutting russet potatoes into steak fry shapes, tossing them with olive oil, salt and pepper.  After 45 minutes or so, tossing with a spatula a couple times during cooking, you’ve got great steak fries.  The béarnaise sauce was easy.  I found this blender béarnaise from Tyler Florence.  I had made it a couple hours ahead and it kept perfectly, just by the stove.

Steamed Broccolini

Just how it sounds, I steamed broccolini and tossed some butter, salt and pepper.  You have to serve something green with this meal.

Chocolate and Peanut Butter Mousse Tower with Banana Tuile and Bourbon Banana Rounds

This was the third idea from the food show and it was from the same restaurant as the steak, Bern’s Steak House.  This one was Sunny Anderson and it was a great combination.  I couldn’t find a good recipe for peanut butter mousse so I just followed a chocolate mousse recipe, substituting peanut butter where the chocolate would go.  Since I had to make a chocolate one and a peanut butter one I made the base of one full recipe of the mousse which is whipping egg whites with sugar and then whipping heavy cream.  I divided them in half and with multiple bowls I combined half the chocolate with half the egg whites and cream, and with the other half of the egg whites and cream I folded in some freshly made peanut butter (from the peanut butter machine at Whole Foods).  So now I got the mousses…I combined crushed chocolate wafer cookies and melted butter that I then pressed into the bottom and slightly up the sides of a ring mold that I lined with parchment paper (so I’d be able to get it out later).  I spooned in a little of each mousse and chilled the towers until I was ready to serve.  I made a banana tuile {tweel} cookie, by kind of following two different tuile recipes and they were ok.  The problem was that they stick to your teeth.  I will have to perfect that recipe before I give it to you.  I cooked some banana rounds in some melted sugar and butter then deglazed with Bourbon.  To plate I removed the ring mold and the parchment paper from the towers and placed them on the dessert plates.  I then placed a banana tuile on the top of the tower and then spooned the bourbon bananas around the plate. It was really good, I felt like I just ate at Bern’s Steak House in Tampa Florida.