Category: beef

Asian-Inspired Chimichurri Roast

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Chimichurri is one of my favorite marinades for steak, especially cuts that typically are less tender. The combination of fresh herbs, garlic, vinegar, and oil provide a vibrant smell and satisfying taste. Having experimented with variations over the past few weeks, we’re excited to share this Asian-inspired version with you. Adding Thai basil and Thai chilies adds a great depth of flavor and spiciness we know you’ll love.

When cooking this pot roast slowly in a skillet, the bottom gets a hard sear, similar to burnt ends on smoked meats (without the dryness). That said, if you’d like to minimize that hard sear, I recommend adding 1 cup of beef or chicken stock to the skillet. This may accelerate the cooking time; so checking the temperature at 10 minute intervals will be important. However you choose to cook this meal, we hope you’ll enjoy it.

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Homemade Corned Beef

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This time of year, every year, corned beef brisket returns in force to the butchers section of your local grocery store. Corned beef is a guilty pleasure of mine, and we’ve gone through 10-15 lbs every March. The pink interior of the brisket you’ve known and loved is from using either pink salt with sodium nitrate or other added nitrates/nitrites. Skipping this will result in a grayer brisket, but still great flavor.

This year, we decided to take the plunge and figure out how to make our own corned beef. Fun fact: the “corned” in corned beef has to do with salt-curing, or brining, the brisket. We experimented with a quick corning, and while the flavor was good after 24 hours, the brisket was dry and less tender. Make sure to allow the brisket to brine for at least 5 days, if not 6-10 days. If you don’t have that kind of time, find an already corned brisket and throw it in your Instant Pot—you’ll be up and running for St. Patrick’s day in record time.

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Beef and Eggplant Red Curry

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Over the past few months, we have been making arrangements for our first child as well as learning the ropes of pregnancy. One of the most common tropes we’ve heard is the random, off-putting, late-night food cravings; in most stories, the dutiful spouse rushes off to a store or restaurant to buy whatever will satisfy the craving. This hasn’t been our experience, however. It’s true that we may have more coconut- and cashew-based ice cream on hand than normal; but we also finished wiring the outlet for our chest freezer very recently. The extra space for frozen foods also meant buying 36 pounds of grass-fed lamb.

Even before the pregnancy, there were regular requests for curry dishes. Our local international market has a great red curry paste, that we’ve since found online, and we have a homemade green curry we love. This recipe was another excuse to make curry, and it does not disappoint. We ate it for days, and it was a hearty meal by itself or paired with cauliflower rice.

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Solyanka

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We have had some pretty cold and dreary weather lately, and this kind of weather always causes me to crave soup. This weekend, Brent was eager to experiment with something new. Brent discovered Solyanka, a spicy and sour soup that originates from Russia but is also popular in Germany and former Eastern Block countries.

Solyanka is traditionally prepared in three different varieties: meat, fish, or mushroom. When Brent shared our recipe development with our friend Russ, who you might know as The Domestic Man, his first question was “Meat, fish, or mushroom?” As someone who specializes in recreating traditional recipes, it was no surprise to us that he was already familiar.

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Tex-Mex Breakfast Bake

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For the start of 2017, I’m trying something that I normally despise—eating breakfast. Most mornings, I don’t find myself particularly hungry and I get by with a cup of black coffee and wait until lunch. That said, it’s always been a hunger decision rather than a dislike of breakfast foods. You can see from our multiple breakfast recipes that we’re pretty keen on breakfast foods (although Heather is a much bigger fan of pancakes and waffles).

This recipe hits a number of must-haves for me: you can make it in one pot, it makes multiple servings, and you can make it spicy. This skillet dish reminds me a bit of chili, but the addition of cauliflower and the final step of baking the dish brings the texture closer to a breakfast casserole. And if you’re like me, and like things spicy, you can cover it in hot sauce with no regrets.

Without further ado, I hope you’ll enjoy this recipe for our tex-mex style breakfast bake.

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