Steak Au Poivre - Steak Au YEAH!

Beef, its whats for dinner.

Friday night, my fiancee and I were having her brother and brother's girlfriend over for dinner. During a recent email conversation we discussed what were going to have for dinner.

We decided that we haven't had a good steak in a while and haven't had a massive good Cabernet in a while. I love this pair, the flavors of the fat with the meat, a long with whatever sauce/marinade you prepare this with, goes perfectly with a massive California Cabernet. Just massive, bold, Cabernet with lots of oak, cassis, vanilla, etc. My mouth is salivating just thinking about it.

I asked her to get the steaks, and I would get the wine. NY Strip was her choice as it is mine as well. Sure, everyone likes a filet, but think about it...fat in the steak stores the flavors more. And filet, well it doesn't have any fat. I love a good NY Strip - who doesn't?

I decided that I wasn't just going to make a steak dinner. I was going to make Steak au poivre.

For those of you that have never experienced a culinary delight such as this...get out of the hole that you live in. If you don't like black pepper...stop reading my blog. You will enjoy this place a whole lot better.

Now I know "traditionally" - Steak au poivre is made with a filet, and thats fine and all, but the fat in a strip renders in the pan, and just adds some balls to the dish. Thats right, I went there.

Steak au poivre is really easy to do just as long as you know what you are doing. It's so simple to make, yet the flavors are so massive, so awesome and there is a major party going on.

Should be called "Steak Au YEAH!"

We decided that the best course of action for the sides of this dish would be a simple, easy and extremely good stuffed roasted tomato. It would also be accompanied by a very good, simple and tart house salad. This was perfect, cause the tomato goes VERY well with the steak, and the salad goes well with the summertime weather. Heaven on a plate.

We opened two bottles of wine about 30 minutes prior to the dinner. An Avalon Cabernet and The Crusher Cabernet. These two wines are just ginormous with flavor, and as they opened up more - the smoothed out and were very soft on the pallet. They actually cut the flavor of seared peppercorns and steak as we drank. A very big mouth feel, with some ink texture involved. Just awesome.

As we dug into the juicy steak, with the peppercorn sauce on top, I just heard the "mmmm's" and "wow's" from our guests. I knew that I hit a homerun with this one. They couldn't stop complimenting the meal...which like I said...was heaven on a plate.

If you are ever in the mood to try something new with your steaks...give steak au poivre a try. You will not be dissapointed.

Cheers!

Want the recipe? Ask me!