This is really easy and tasty and is something a little different using stuff you might have lying around in your woefully disorganized kitchen cabinets and stashed away in your “Abandon hope, all ye who enter” fridge.
This served the two of us plus a little more for The Faithful Hound. The genius of this recipe, for him, is that you add the steak at the end, you don’t marinate it beforehand.
1 pound steak (flank, top sirloin, whatever you can afford)
1 to 2 fresh red chilies, depending on your tolerance for heat
3 cloves fresh garlic, peeled
1 tablespoon sugar
4 tablespoons (1/4 cup) fish sauce
Juice of 2 limes from your home bar
2 medium onions, thinly sliced
A few chives, sliced into 1-inch lengths, more or less
Some cilantro, but optional for the cilantro-averse, like myself
Green salad of your choice
In a pan or on the grill (or on your countertop grill), sear the unseasoned steak until browned well on both sides, and cook to medium rare or however you eat steak, which should be medium rare. Let the steak rest while you:
In a mortar and pestle, mash together the garlic and chilies to create a paste. If you don’t have a mortar and pestle, and you really should, and both our sets are souvenirs from traveling abroad…anyway, do the old put contents in a very small sheet of plastic wrap and push down using the bottom of a heavy pan trick, which you can also do to flatten meat. If you do the flattening technique, use more ingredients because you’ll lose a bit, possibly quite a bit, to the plastic wrap. Scrape the paste into a large bowl, and add the lime juice, fish sauce, and sugar. Mix well to dissolve the sugar. Add the thinly sliced onions, chives, and cilantro if using (blecch), and toss well to combine. Next, slice the steak into thin, even slices across the grain, put a little bit into The Faithful Hound’s kibble, and add the rest to the salad. Mix again thoroughly and allow to marinate for at least 30 minutes for the flavors to meld.
This being a Thai(-ish) recipe, you can also serve it over rice, or you can use it as a filling for tortilla or lettuce wraps.
Sounds delicious – thank goodness the Faithful Hound was included.
The poor Faithful Hound is on a diet! Yes. What happened was our vet decided to take a close look at his teeth and discovered that a couple of rear ones were cracked and another one or two needed extracting. The dog wasn’t in any pain but it would only be a matter of time. The vet said that he would do the extractions but he would feel a lot more confident putting him under anesthesia if we could get him to lose a few pounds. So we did. We’ve kept this diet up and it’s like he’s years younger. We give him 1 can of high-end dog food every day and one healthy treat. I also slip him a little food when Better Half is otherwise distracted but that’s it. So of course now he hates me and it’s all my fault and I’ve told him more than once that there’s more to life than just the length of it but my hands are tied but he turns a deaf ear to my explanations. Oh well. He has the distinction of being the only living creature I know of who harbors resentment against me, and I can’t blame him.
Just remember dogs are master manipulators and those looks are just the result of patient trial and error looking for one that got you to perform the trick they wanted out of you. We just don’t remember all of the looks they discarded when they didn’t work.
That looks good.
It is very good. What’s wrong with your leg, anyway, if you don’t mind my asking? Did I miss something somewhere? Well, welcome to the club, but I hope you’ll only be a temporary member. Mine has been diagnosed but apparently there’s no cure, or at least none of my many doctors seem to be looking for one. Even though the Mayo Clinic website says that it’s important to diagnose the cause for what I have, all I’m being told is that all the tests are coming up fine and I should just “manage” the situation I’m in. Very frustrating, and just like when they pave paradise and put up a parking lot, you don’t know what you got ’til it’s gone.
Yeah, I tore my meniscus in a freak accident here on the farm. I’m waiting to see if it needs arthroscopic surgery.