Sirloin Steak Italian Style

Think you can’t go low carb with Italian?  Think Italian means only pizza, breadsticks and pasta?  Well, think harder!  Italian cuisine is robustly expansive.  Just remember Italy has a long coastline.  Fish is prominent and I’m not talking Captain D’s.

Then there’s the sumptuous meats, from Parma ham to another thousand varieties of cured meats and salamis.  Salami itself is another wonder world of flavors and none of them taste like the packaged, un-definable, nitrate saturated stuff labeled salami in most American supermarkets.

Today, I’ll take you past even the Italian meats you know and let you in on a new favorite of mine, Sirloin Italian Style.

This recipe isn’t original, but then few recipes are.  The basis came from a magazine, Tastes of Italia.  Nice magazine that’s mostly about Italians who immigrated to California a few generations ago, but haven’t forgotten how to cook.

Hard to call this a recipe, which is essentially steak and wine, with chopped this and that, all of it your choice.  But, that’s the essence of cooking, right?  Machines can easily be programmed to follow recipes.  How do you think canned goods and even bread can be shipped, or baked around the country, and always taste the same?

As a rule, I stay away from prepared foods, but I have to admit I don’t make my own donuts.

Home cooking seldom tastes the same way twice, because it’s seldom prepared the same way twice, even when you use the same ingredients.  Why?  The meats and vegetables are never exactly the same.

Check this simple example: Every time I squeeze fresh orange juice, there’s always a difference in flavor.  Maybe because I used different varieties, but most likely it’s because every orange is different, even if they all come from the same tree.  Then why do commercial orange juices always taste exactly the same?

Commercial orange juice is a combination of thousands of oranges, often stored in huge vats for up to a year.  All the air is removed from the vats to prolong the life of the juice.  Lack of air also makes the juice tasteless, or so I’m told.  Companies then use specific flavor enhancers to re-flavor the juice and therefore it all tastes the same, every time.

Ok, let’s get back to Italian steak and wine.  This recipe, as simple as it is, needs some forethought.  Follow along and you’ll see why.  One of the things I love about this recipe is that with a little planning, I’m never working very long at any one time.

Sirloin Steak Italian Style

About 2 Pounds (1 kilo) of sirloin.  I used two good-sized steaks.

1 bottle of dry red wine

Diced vegetables of your choice.  I used half a thin sliced onion, four cloves of garlic chopped, two stalks of celery diced, and two good-sized sprigs of fresh rosemary.  Surely you have a rosemary bush growing in your garden or flowerbed.  No?  You heathen!

Some people say to chop the rosemary.  No need.  The leaves come off in the cooking and the stalks are easily removed before serving.

How to:

Salt and pepper the steaks.  Put them in a gallon sized, sealable bag.  Add the vegetables and the full bottle of wine.

Put the bag in the refrig and leave it overnight.  Turn the bag every now and then.

The next day, preheat your oven to 350ºF (180ºC) 

Remove the steaks, brushing off the marinade, add a little olive oil to a large frying pan and quickly sear them on both sides.  Leave the steaks in the pan and pour in the bag of marinade.  Bring to a boil.  Cover and put the pan in the 350ºF (180ºC) oven for two hours.

I served mine with broccoli, steamed, then pan roasted.  Add Mirin (Japanese sweet cooking wine) and soy sauce as the broccoli is roasting.

Ok.  Time to refresh your hungry guests’ goblets and get down to some Sirloin Italian Style!

Just be prepared for at least one guest to remark:  “Jeez, I thought Italian meant pasta.”  Those folks clearly have no imagination.  Don’t invite them back and turn down all their invitations unless you want to dine on cans of Chef Boy-r-something, or Coast-to-Coast Pizza.

Why would you want to punish your taste buds like that, when I'm offering you Sirloin Steak Italian Style?

Frittata on Sunday

Some folks describe frittata as an omelet.  Others say it’s quiche without the crust.  All of them are clutching at straws.  Really, does a quiche taste like an omelet?  You kidding? Yeah, sure and you might as well say a hamburger tastes like a flattened hotdog.

Frittata brings a lot more to the table than mere sustenance. It’s a toss together microcosm of the Italian happy-go-lucky view of life: First we cook, then we take off our clothes, pour some Prosecco, and share an Italian Happy Meal.  What time does your husband come home?

Well, maybe they’d never say that, but you’d follow the gist with the sensually erotic smiles and the expressive hand gestures that wrinkle your blouse.

You’re asking yourself, all that in a dish of eggs?  Oh, yeah!  But, as an American, you must be able to transform yourself and your state of mind.  Takes practice. First, the average American male must lose thirty pounds.  The front of your pants must not look like an overextended trampoline, with the belt as a safety device.

Cinch that waistline until your eyes bulge and your cheeks begin to collapse.  Unbutton that shirt a bit.  Let a cigarette languish on your lips, even if you don’t smoke. Roll up the sleeves of your linen shirt. Carelessly don a classy sports jacket with no tie and don’t forget to push up the sleeves. Turn up the collar. Practice Al Pacino’s lingering eye contact, and give your lips a sensual curve, even when saying simple things like:  the grinding of salt reminds me of your teeth mia amore, red brick matches your eyes mia cara, and soft socks flatter your stubby toes mia principessa.

Now I know you’re ready to do some ‘talian cookin’.  Ok, here’s the prep work.  Chat casually with two or three lovelies, in your white linen shirt, open at the collar, while sipping a glass of Italian wine, and feeling more at ease than the fire-red Ferrari in your cobblestone driveway.  Throw in vowels at random.

Mix in a few hand gestures that tell the world Miss Universe begged for it, but (insert a big what-can-you-do shrug) you’re only one man.

Keep that frame of mind going while you cook this low carb, easy, sumptuous crowd pleaser.  This recipe serves two, but easily doubles or triples or more…

Frittata For Sunday

One small onion, diced

4 Eggs

1/2 Cup half & half (I used 1/4 Cup whipping cream and 1/4  Cup water, but use any dairy you wish)

Olive oil

1/3 Cup thinly sliced and chopped hard cheese of your choice (I used Pecorino with chili peppers)

1/3 Cub grated Parmesan

Couple of tablespoons of chopped fresh basil, or your favorite herb

Salt and pepper to taste

Pour your guests and yourself another glass of wine.

Mix the eggs, cream and water in a small bowl. Add 1/4 teaspoon salt and pepper.

Preheat the oven to 350ºF (180ºC)

Splash a couple of teaspoons of olive oil in a small frying pan.  Add the diced onion and cook on medium to low heat until the onion is translucent.  Remove half the cooked onion and put it aside for now. Leave the rest in the frying pan.

Pour the egg mixture into the frying pan and turn up the heat just a bit.  This is not a quick fry dish.

As the egg mixture begins to crawl up the sides of the pan and before the center is set, scatter on the rest of the diced onion and add the bits of sliced cheese.

The onions and cheese should sink into the frittata.  Give it a minute, then sprinkle on the grated Parmesan.

Slip the pan into a 350ºF (180ºC) oven and allow the frittata to cook until it is firm and beginning to very lightly brown on top.

Remove the cooked frittata from the oven and toss on the chopped basil.

I like to serve this dish with English style bacon.  Not familiar?  English bacon is cured from the top of the loin.  The English refer to American bacon as ‘streaky bacon,’ which comes from the belly.

Note:  Variations on frittata are almost limitless.  Add anything you like, from chopped Italian Sausage, to chopped dried tomatoes, and any cheese that calls to your taste buds.  Hey, this dish is Italian and just as happy go lucky!

In case you think I’m being too hard on Italian men, let me clarify.  I plan to move to Italy, buy a villa on the Mediterranean, have a wife and two very frisky maids, and drive a Lambo….as soon as I’m young enough.

The Generals: Patton, MacArthur, Marshall and the Winning of World War II, by Winston Groom

How often we remember famous names, but not exactly what they did, or what they were like, or where they came from.  The Generals, takes us on a well guided tour of the lives of three giants from the Second World War, Patton, MacArthur, and Marshall.  Three men, very different in temperament, strengths, and weaknesses.

Patton is probably the best well known of the three, in large part due to the eponymous Oscar winning film starring George C. Scott.  Scott also took the Oscar for Best Actor, but unlike the general, who was known for his love of the spotlight, Scott did not accept the Oscar, but he wore the famous ivory-handled pistols well.

Patton was once asked about his pearl handled pistols.  His attributed reply was pure Patton:  Son, only a pimp in a Louisiana whore house carries pearl handled revolvers, these are ivory.

There have also been many films about Douglas MacArthur, the last being The Emperor in 2012, starring Tommy Lee Jones.  Many would recognize the corncob pipe, aviator sunglasses and crushed military cap.

George Marshall is perhaps the least known by today’s public, but was called by Winston Churchill, “The organizer of victory.”  In addition to his military career, he served in many high governmental positions, including Secretary of State, and Secretary of Defense.  So why isn’t he more well known?  The simple answer is he didn’t win fame on the battlefield.  His organizational and planning abilities were so great that even before he was a Lieutenant Colonel, his expertise led him to be called by name from one staff job to another.  In World War II, his was the guiding hand behind every strategic and logistical decision across both theaters of war, Europe and the Pacific.

So, what about Winston Groom’s book, The Generals?  In a word, fascinating.  His prose style is closer to that of a skilled novelist who keeps you turning pages and keeps you up late at night.  Anyone can list a chronology, which becomes deadly boring after a page or two, but Groom is a storyteller and a storyteller fills in the gaps and places his subjects in a moving panorama of the times and circumstances.

Throughout the book, the personalities shine brightly, not only in the context of military performance, but loves, hates, friends, and associates.  Groom follows these men from West Point (Patton and MacArthur), Virginia Military Institute (Marshall), through the Mexican border conflicts, World War I, and the conflagration that was truly world wide, World War II.  He intertwines ups, downs, disappointments, and successes, always tying them to family, personality, and sense of duty.

You find yourself as a fly on the wall, as three of our greatest military leaders endure and rebound, time and again, through the flames of war and the sadness of personal tragedy.  Reading this book, you come face to face with ordinary men, who drove themselves hard to become exceptional men.

If you care about history, military history, and even the psychology of leadership, you don’t want to miss The Generals, by Winston Groom.  But, be forewarned, these three giants of World War II are going to leave you with both a feeling of inadequacy that you should have done more, but also with the encouraging hope that you can do more.

Low Carb Curried Pork Stew

A couple of things you should know about me.  Don’t care to know? Fine!  Skip down to the semi-fabulous recipe that can cook while you’re off to visit your busy day and still feed your ungrateful family who has no idea how hard you work and all the things you do for them daily.

But, enough about you.  Let’s get back to me and the things you should know.  I love to cook…scratch that…I love to empress people with my cooking.  I only invite people who are exuberantly thrilled to be impressed.  I am also lazy…well not really lazy….ok, really lazy.  I like to work at a frenzy, then casually sip a wine or three with my freeloading friends, while the spectacularly delicious meal takes care of itself.  Lots of ways to do that and one of my favorites goes under the unremarkable heading of stew.

In my never ending search for the unremarkably remarkable, I chanced upon a stew recipe that with just a bit of tweaking could turn a suburbanite’s common Mustang into a fire-spitting Shelby Cobra.  I know, I know.  Mixed metaphors.  First cooking, then screaming sports cars.  But, that fire-spitting Shelby Cobra sticks In your mind, n’est pas?  Mission Accomplished!

On to the recipe.

Low Carb Curried Pork Stew

Hint:  If you’re getting an early morning start, cook this stew the night before.

Pre-heat your oven to 275ºF (140ºC)

1 Pound (or a bit more) of either cooked, or raw pork.  I used some of each.

3 cloves of fresh garlic, thinly sliced

Salt and pepper to taste or about ½ teaspoon each

6 Ounces button mushrooms, washed and quartered

½ Medium onion, diced

½ Red bell pepper, sliced

½ Green bell pepper, sliced

1 Large parsnip, julienned

4 Tablespoons of your favorite concentrated curry paste.  I use Patak’s.

1 Can (about 1 ½ to 2 Cups) double strength beef broth, undiluted

2 Cups chicken broth

Juice of ½ Lime to finish

Puttin’ It All Together:

If you’re using raw pork, drop a tablespoon or two of oil in a frying pan and lightly brown the meat, adding salt and pepper.  Don’t worry about the pork not cooking completely!  The stew will be in the oven a few hours.

Put the vegetables in a large skillet and lightly cook them.  This reduces the water in the vegetables and intensifies the flavor. 

In your stew pot, put a bit of oil and the minced onions and garlic slices. Cook until they wilt.  Add all the pork and stir.

Add the beef and chicken broths and bring to a boil.  Add the curry paste and stir well.  Add the vegetables.

Put a top on your stew pot, slip it into the 275ºF (140ºC) oven and go do something else for three hours.

When the stew comes out of the oven, taste, and add salt and pepper as necessary.

Squeeze the juice of half a lime over the stew and stir.

Ladle the stew into bowls and serve with a slice of lime.

This stew goes well with either swilling a beer, or sipping a Pinot Grigio!