Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Filet Mignon w Balsamic Reduction & Basil Olive Oil

Posted by CB / 3 comments » / Recipes, beef

I think I’ve mentioned before that my husband is a chicken eater. I’m the beef eater in this family. He has nothing against beef but he prefers the white meat. Typical breast man. But I prefer beef esp if there’s bacon involved. And since I’m the cook. It’s what’s for dinner.

Let’s talk about sex steak, Baby! The thing about steak. One of my friends (We affectionately call him The Grill Master) tells me all the time that a good steak doesn’t need anything accept salt and pepper for flavor. But I have to politely disagree. I need a good dipping sauce for my steak. There were a lot of steak sauces out there on Food Blog Search. There were cream ones, cheese ones, wine ones but I finally settled on the balsamic based one b/c I’m a big FREAK about balsamic vinegar. From pizza to mozzarella+tomatoes to salad. It’s good on everything.

Totally off topic.

Ok maybe semi off topic because we ARE talking about cows right now but do you remember that “Shake That Thang” Carls Jr commercials? I can not get that DAMN song out of my head. I will go as far as to say that I think the commercial even inspired this meal. I just really wanted a steak after seeing it. HA HA! Now be honest. You either want a steak or milkshake (or both?) right now. I feel ya. I’m “this” close to driving to Carl’s Jr. for a chocolate shake myself.

Back on topic.

I served my filets with brown rice and parmesan asparagus.

Can I give you a little tip about rice cookers? Make sure that when you flip the rice cooker switch to “cook” that you don’t realize an hour later that you forgot to plug it in. Seems self explanatory but it happens to the best of us. Me included. Twice. In a row. Doh!

I feel like I need to insert a twitter hashtag here. #absentmindedmakesthefoodgrowcolder

Filet Mignon w Balsamic Reduction & Basil Olive Oil

Recipe adapted from Pans, Pucks and Pantry

Ingredients:

2-5oz bacon wrapped filet mignon
salt and pepper, to taste
1 tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 tbsp unsalted butter
Basil olive oil* for drizzling

* I buy my basil olive oil from Temecula Olive Oil Company. SO.FRIGGIN.GOOD!

Instructions:

Preheat oven to 375F.

Remove filet mignon from package and sprinkled generously with salt and pepper, to taste.

Set up a large saute pan over high heat. When a bead of water sizzles and evaporates on contact, add 1 tbsp of oil and swirl to coat pan. Add the filets to pan and sear both sides about 2-3 minutes. Do not move filets after you put them in the pan or they won't sear properly. When a crust has formed and they are easy to move transfer to oven to finish cooking about 15 minutes for medium well. Take out of oven and let rest for 5 minutes before serving.

While filets are cooking in the oven, prepare balsamic reduction. In the same pan you seared the filets add balsamic vingear over medium-high heat. Using a spatula, deglaze by scraping the brown bits from the bottom of the pan. Let thicken and reduce for about 3 minutes. Turn off heat and add butter. Whisk until sauce is smooth.

Pour sauce over filets and drizzle some basil olive oil on top. (I reserved some balsamic sauce as a dipping sauce for my filets!)

ENJOY!

Husband rating: A
He’s more of a less is more for steak so he went light on the sauce (w00t! More for me!) but still raved that the sauce provided a great flavor to the steak.

Wifey rating: A+
Just what the doctor ordered. This steak and balsamic sauce saved my life. It would be worth it to get beef poisoning for this one. Just saying…

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