Meat

Blue Cheese Compound Butter

Dax Phillips 1 Comment

Last week was a great week to say the least. Not only was I able to take a couple of days off of work to take my family camping, but my wife and kids treated me like a king on Father’s Day. To be honest, I’m not a big fan of the whole concept of Father’s Day, but heck I’ll take a bit of pampering and great sentiments from my kids. With that said, my wife had suggested that we have her dad and brother over and we would cook out some steaks. As my wife suggested that she do all of the cooking, I quickly sidetracked her and informed her that I would do the cooking. I was not about to buy great beef and have my wife not be able to handle the grill and get the temperature right on eight steaks. No offense, but it was probably best for everyone.

So my decision on the meal was a steakhouse fare. Ribeye’s, fillets, rosemary baked potatoes, roasted corn, roasted mushrooms, and a simple salad. That’s when I thought I would make a couple of different compound butters; a cilantro and garlic for the corn, and a blue cheese butter for the steaks. If you have never tried the combination of blue cheese, and beef, well please open that door and give it a shot. It’s such a wonderful combination.

Blue Cheese Compound Butter Recipe

This does not get any easier to make, so let’s get started.

Ingredients:

  • Your favorite cut of beef, cooked to your liking
  • 4 tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 1/4 tsp cracked black pepper
  • 1/4 cup your favorite crumbled blue cheese, room temperature

How to make blue cheese compound butter

That’s it. Basically take the butter, blue cheese, and cracked black pepper and add them to a small bowl.

Use a fork, and mix, and lightly mash the butter with the cheese. You can roll this into a log within plastic wrap if you desire, but I did not go that route with this one. When your steak is cooked, and still nice and warm, add a dollop of the blue cheese compound butter onto the top of it, and dig in.

This butter was a perfect pairing with the perfectly cooked ribeye, and it just made it so much better. Hope you enjoy!

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Blue Cheese Compound Butter
Author: 
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
 
Ingredients
  • Your favorite cut of beef, cooked to your liking
  • 4 tbsp unsalted butter, room temperature
  • ¼ tsp cracked black pepper
  • ¼ cup your favorite crumbled blue cheese, room temperature
Instructions
  1. Use a fork, and mix, and lightly mash the butter with the cheese. You can roll this into a log within plastic wrap if you desire, but I did not go that route with this one. When your steak is cooked, and still nice and warm, add a dollop of the blue cheese compound butter onto the top of it, and dig in.

 

Bacon Wrapped Fatty

Dax Phillips 3 Comments

I know the name of this recipe is pretty hilarious, but recently I joined an online barbecue forum, and everyone was talking about the ‘fatty’. I can see why they call it that, most likely due to all of the bacon, and pork, but trust me on this one, this thing is nothing but awesome. There are a few great things about making this, as one you get to make a bacon weave, lay out some great ground pork, and stuff the pork with whatever you have in mind, then roll it up, and place it on the smoker. I got really excited when making this, and the end result was something my entire family loved.

Bacon Wrapped Fatty Recipe

Let’s get started.

Ingredients:

  • 16 slices of bacon
  • 2 lbs Italian sausage, or ground pork
  • 2 jalapeno peppers, seeded and diced
  • 3 small cremini mushrooms, chopped
  • 1 small onion, diced
  • 4 basil leaves, chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1 1/2 cups of shredded mozzarella cheese
  • pizza sauce
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • wax paper
  • gallon size sealable bag
  • smoker

Now let me start by saying you can stuff this however you want. I went more of an Italian style stuffing because I wanted to finish the bacon wrapped fatty with pizza sauce rather than barbecue sauce, but take the general layout here and make it your own.

Start by making your bacon weave. I will not go over those details, but it only takes a few minutes. There are many online instructions how to make one. One resource is this one, on YouTube.

Once the bacon weave is made, lay it on a large sheet of wax paper.  Next add the Italian sausage to a sealable plastic bag, and with a rolling pin, gently roll the sausage back and forth and side to side to level it out.

Once the pork is nice and even, using a scissors, cut along side the edges of the bag. Carefully flip it over and onto the second piece of wax paper.

How to make a bacon wrapped fatty

Add the mushrooms, garlic, onion, cheese, and jalapenos to the top, center of the flattened sausage. Carefully start rolling the pork mixture into a log using the wax paper as your guide. Once you have it in log form, using your hands, seal up the edges, then add the log onto the top of the bacon.

Repeat the process with the bacon. Now you have a bacon and pork log!

Place this onto your smoker. It’s going to smoke for a few hours. I smoked it on low for about 3 hours, then finished in the oven after lathering some pizza sauce onto it. You want the internal temperature of the pork to be about 165.

Smoked Fatty

When you are ready to serve, slice into rounds, and serve with any of your favorite sides.

The end result is a great smoky flavor, along with an exterior of crispy bacon, and an interior of super tender pork, melted cheese, and great vegetables. It was surprising, to say the least, how great this was. I had it as a sandwich the following day, and don’t even get me started on that one! If you are looking for a new item to put on your smoker, and one that will serve many, give this one a shot. Hope you enjoy!

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Bacon Wrapped Fatty
Author: 
Recipe type: Barbecue
Prep time: 
Cook time: 
Total time: 
Serves: 12
 
Ingredients
  • 16 slices of bacon
  • 2 lbs Italian sausage, or ground pork
  • 2 jalapeno peppers, seeded and diced
  • 3 small cremini mushrooms, chopped
  • 1 small onion, diced
  • 4 basil leaves, chopped
  • 2 cloves garlic, minced
  • 1½ cups of shredded mozzarella cheese
  • pizza sauce
  • salt and pepper to taste
  • wax paper
  • gallon size sealable bag
  • smoker
Instructions
  1. Start by making your bacon weave. I will not go over those details, but it only takes a few minutes. There are many online instructions how to make one. One resource is this one, on YouTube.
  2. Once the bacon weave is made, lay it on a large sheet of wax paper. Next add the Italian sausage to a sealable plastic bag, and with a rolling pin, gently roll the sausage back and forth and side to side to level it out.
  3. Once the pork is nice and even, using a scissors, cut along side the edges of the bag. Carefully flip it over and onto the second piece of wax paper.
  4. Add the mushrooms, garlic, onion, cheese, and jalapenos to the top, center of the flattened sausage. Carefully start rolling the pork mixture into a log using the wax paper as your guide. Once you have it in log form, using your hands, seal up the edges, then add the log onto the top of the bacon.
  5. Repeat the process with the bacon. Now you have a bacon and pork log!
  6. Place this onto your smoker. It’s going to smoke for a few hours. I smoked it on low for about 3 hours, then finished in the oven after lathering some pizza sauce onto it. You want the internal temperature of the pork to be about 165.
  7. When you are ready to serve, slice into rounds, and serve with any of your favorite sides.

 

Horseradish Cream Sauce for Steaks

Dax Phillips Leave a comment

Are you like me and have about 45 different condiments in your refrigerator? I know I’ve probably said this time and time again, but my wife want me to get another refrigerator for the garage, just to store my condiments. Yep, seven mustards, fish sauces, oyster sauce, you name it, I probably have it. I love condiments. I’ll admit that. I love everything they have to offer in terms of adding flavor to anything you throw at them. There is one condiment that I totally love though, and that is horeradish. Yeah, that pungent, gnarly root of a sauce that opens the nasal passages and give you an awesome kick. What I love with horseradish though is beef. Beef and horseradish is like the peanut butter and jelly sandwich combination. They are meant for one another. They truly are a perfect marriage.

Horseradish Cream Sauce Recipe

This past Christmas, I knocked out my New York strip roast, and as I made things like chimichurri, blue cheese sauce, caramelized onions, and steakhouse style mushrooms to go along with the steak, the horseradish cream sauce stole the show, at least in my opinion.

Let’s get started.

Ingredients:

 

  • 1/2 cup mayonnaise
  • 1/4 cup sour cream
  • 4 tbsp prepared horseradish
  • 1/2 lemon, juiced
  • 2 tbsp green onions, thinly sliced
  • 1/2 tsp cracked black pepper
  • 1/2 tsp salt, to taste

It doesn’t get any easier for a sauce, trust me.

horseradish-cream-sauce-ingredients

Add everything to a mixing bowl, stir well, and taste. Season with any additional salt, pepper, or additional horseradish if you want it a bit spicier.

When you are ready to serve, spoon a generous amount of the horseradish cream sauce alongside your beef, or heck even better make some steak frites and dip some fries in it to boot.

Steak Frites Recipe

 

The flavor combination will blow you away. Don’t even get me started on making a sandwich and smothering the horseradish cream sauce all over. Don’t.

Horseradish Cream Sauce with Beef

That refrigerator? I probably need to get one in 2015. Maybe I’ll add that to one of my goals.  Hope you enjoy!

 

Steak Frites

Dax Phillips Leave a comment

I had family over for this past Christmas holiday dinner. It is something that I always like to do, and I always enjoy cooking for others, and so this year I decided to make, once again, my garlic herb crusted New York strip roast. Hands down, this steak is just loaded with flavor and so tender it cuts like butter with a warm knife. I’ll admit I was even excited when I called to order it from our local butcher, Ray’s Butcher Shoppe. With that said, my goal was to make steak frites (literally steak and fries), but that is a challenging one to make for 13 people as I’m a big believer that when making homemade, twice cooked fries (the only way in my opinion), you need to serve them right away. So during the day, and as my wife fell ill to the flu, I cranked out relish dishes, a horseradish cream, chimichurri, caramelized onions, steak house mushrooms, and then decided on making a roasted garlic and rosemary  mashed potato, and a mixed green salad. Yeah, I was busy, but that did not discourage me from making steak frites the following day, yes, the following day for breakfast.

Steak Frites Recipe

Let’s get started.

Ingredients:

  • 1 New York Strip, cooked under medium
  • 2 tbsp unsalted butter
  • 2 whole russet potatoes, peeled, cut into 1 1/2 inch matchsticks
  • Large bowl of cold water
  • 6 cups of peanut oil, about 2 inches deep in a pot
  • blue cheese crumbles, optional
  • salt, to taste
  • cracked black pepper to taste

As you can see from my photo, I have a bit of those mushrooms with onions and capers from the previous evening from my leftovers, as well as some of the horseradish cream sauce which I will post later this week, but those are entirely optional at this point. Recommended, yes, but optional.

Start by heating your pot on medium heat. Add the peanut oil, and if you have a cooking thermometer, now is a good time to use it by inserting the bulb into the oil. You are going to cook these fries in batches, a couple of times. While the oil heats up, take a handful of the cut potatoes, and place them on some paper towel, or towel, and pat them dry. You do not want water going into hot oil, EVER.

Once the oil comes to 350 degrees, add the handful of dry potatoes. Cook for about 3-4 minutes, then remove them with a slotted spoon, allowing the oil to drain back into the pot.

Place the first cooked potatoes into a paper towel lined bowl.

How to make Steak Frites

Let the oil come back up to temperature, 350 degrees, then repeat with the uncooked potatoes (pat them dry, add them to the oil).

Now let’s focus on that wonderful piece of beef.

To a large skillet, on medium heat, add the butter. Let this slowly start to melt, then add in your steak. Mine was already precooked, just under medium, so at this point I am warming it up with some of the butter, and glazing it along the way. I also like to toss in any fresh herbs I have laying around such as thyme or rosemary, just to infuse the steak with more flavor. If you do not have the leftover beef, simply start grilling it, or cooking it in your skillet and finish off in your oven until you are ready to plate.

Steak Frites Recipe

The next step goes quickly. Once your steak is just about where you want it temperature wise, bring the oil back up to heat, but at this time, 375 degrees.

Once you have reached 375 degrees, add all of the fries, or if you want in batches, back to the oil. Cook for about 4 minutes or just until golden brown. Again, remove with a slotted spoon, or cooking spider, and add them to another paper towel lined bowl. Season generously with salt and pepper, and give them a good toss.

Now you are ready to plate. Add the steak and pan sauces to your plate. Load on the fries, and shower with blue cheese crumbles.

Steak Frites Recipe

Dig in. Yeah, you might just be thinking steak and french fries, but this is where you go wrong. The flavor profile is out of this world. First you have super tender steak, and when eaten with the crisp exterior of the french fry, while being nice an creamy on the inside, well this is when it is a game changer. Don’t even get me started on the blue cheese crumble, and swiping a french fry or three into horseradish cream sauce! Next time you are looking for something other than a baked potato with your steak, think of steak frites, you will be sure to impress anyone! Hope you enjoy, and Happy New Year!