Catch Up 1-13-11

Weekly Recipes

Steak Cobb Salad

Traditionally a cobb salad is made with grilled chicken, but this is a really great way to use some scraps of beef tenderloin, or other trimming you may have lying around.  If you keep your trimmings from beef tenderloin, which hopefully you have already priced worked into your food cost you can charge again for your trimmings into this salad and it is pure profit.  This salad is great in the winter months since none of these ingredients are better summer ingredients.  Classically this salad is served lined up in impressive rows, but certainly it can be tossed so that every ingredient can get into every bite.

Makes 4 servings

2 tablespoons fresh chives or green onions

1/2 cup olive oil

1 T lemon juice

Salt and pepper

6 each diced hot house grown grape tomatoes

6 hard boiled eggs, diced

12 ounces Beef Tenderloin

2 Avocado, diced

1 1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese

1 minced red onion

8 strips bacon, cooked crispy

12 cups lettuce, classically this salad is served with iceberg, but I would use whatever you have available.

1 cup Blue Cheese Dressing, a couple of weeks ago I sent out a recipe for a homemade version

After preparing all of the ingredients lightly salt the avocados and toss with ½ of the lemon juice.  Toss the diced tomatoes with the other ½ lemon juice, ¼ cup of the oil, chives, and a small pinch of salt.  Toss the tenderloin with the remaining olive oil with salt and pepper, and then either grill or sauté the beef tenderloin to medium rare, it will continue to cook while you are plating the dish and end up being more of a medium. 

Assembly:

Toss the dressing and the lettuce together.  Equally arrange the greens in the center of four plates.  Arrange the blue cheese in a vertical line to the right hand side of the plates.  Working right to left continue making the vertical lines with the bacon, eggs, beef tenderloin, avocado, red onion, and lastly the tomatoes, grind a small amount of fresh black pepper on top, 

Nicoise Salad

Well done Nicoise salad is truly a thing of beauty, in this recipe I have taken the canned tuna and replaced it with fresh tuna, but feel free to use a canned version if that’s what is available.  I like to present this as either a salad or an entrée, slightly deconstructed it has a great eye appeal and with great ingredients something so simple can be elevated to a memorable meal, customers will come back for time and again.

Serves 4

2 heads Bibb lettuce

6 ounces green beans-fresh or frozen, blanched in salty water, stems trimmed

1 red bell pepper, roasted, peeled, seeded and sliced into ½ inch thick strips

6 ounces red potatoes, boiled until just done, drained, then browned in a hot skillet

12 each cherry tomatoes, cut in halves, and salted

½ cup kalamata olives

4 each hard-boiled egg

1 Ripe Avocado, cut into ¼ inch strips

Croutons-optional, the potatoes give a nice crunch, but a few of these can put it over the top

Salt and Pepper

12 ounces tuna steak-Recipe Follows

1 ½ cup Nicoise Salad Dressing-Recipe Follows

Tuna:

This is enough seasoning to do several tuna steaks.

1 T Corainder Seed, toasted then ground

1 T Sesame Seed, toasted then ground

1 T Kosher Salt

2 t Smoked Paprika

11/2 t fresh black pepper

½ t ground white pepper

½ t ground red pepper

Tuna-preferable cut into a rectangle

Mix together all the seasonings and roll the tuna loin in the mix, sear in hot pan no longer than 20 seconds on any side. 

Nicoise Salad Dressing

2 ounces Lemon Juice

3 ounces  Red Wine Vinegar

1 T Dijon Mustard

3 each canned anchovy with oil

2 T Chopped fresh herb-like parsley or chervil

8 ounces Canola Oil

Tt Salt and pepper

Place all ingredients except oil in the body of a blender, turn on low speed and slowly add in the oil to make an emulsification.  Season with salt and pepper and reserve to the side, or make it ahead and store in the refrigerator up to a week. 

Assembly:

Slice tuna into equal squares.  Put the lettuce in a large bowl and drizzle with a little of the dressing and toss.  Cut the beans in quarters and place in a bowl with the tomatoes, add the olives, and the pepper, and toss with a small amount of the dressing.  Cut the eggs into quarters and season with a little salt and pepper.  Arrange a layer of lettuce on plate, top with an equal amount of the tomato, green bean, olive, pepper mixture.  Arrange the tuna, eggs, potatoes, and avocado around the salad, top with a few croutons.  Serve extra dressing on the side if necessary.  Garnish with some fresh herbs, top with a little fresh cracked pepper, and serve.