My Weekend: A Smothered Steak Adventure

I know I said last Thursday that had a hankering for Country Fried Steak, but I changed my mind.

I had a busy Saturday planned (during which I accomplished very little, other than exhausting myself thoroughly), and had intended to relax on Sunday.  The best form of relaxation for me is cooking, so I had planned to cook Country Fried Steak.  When it came to it, however, it occurred to me that I had recommended that you use tomato slices as an enhancement to Smothered Steak, and that I had only done this myself in the oven, never on the range-top.

I said to myself, I said "If your going to give advice to folks, don't you think it would be a good idea to test the advice first?"  Well, of course, I had to agree with myself, so I cooked Smothered Steak, with tomato slices, not on my range-top, but in a non-stick electric skillet.

My motivation for doing so was that I was plumb tuckered out from my toils of the previous day; no rest for the wicked, or so it's been said.  We have rules about cooking at our house; one of them is you cook, you clean.   And I just was not up to cleaning.  I wanted to minimize the clean-up, and the electric skillet seemed like a good idea.  Well, it was a good idea.  I got near-perfect results, but only after I had to solve a problem that could have been a show-stopper.

It all stems, you see, from a single truth:  if you're going to make pan gravy, you'll need an egg whisk.  And if you're doing it in an inexpensive non-stick skillet, you'll need a plastic egg whisk in order not to damage the inexpensive non-stick coating.  Well, although my kitchen is well equipped, I have never owned a single plastic egg whisk.  And, of course, by the time I realized this, which was at the precise instant after I had added the first scoop of flour to the oil in the skillet, it was too late.

My solution, which I had to come up with in a hurry, was to use a wire whisk.  Realizing that metal egg whisks are constructed (mine are, at least) of perfectly round steel wire and therefore have no sharp edges, and that it's the sharp metal edges that make metal spatulae the bane of inexpensive non-stick coatings, I thought I might, just might, be able to get away with using a metal whisk if I whisked very, very carefully. 

After gently whisking the flour into the oil, I abandoned the whisk and switched to a plastic spatula to finish the job of cooking the oil/flour mixture.  The pan, it turned out later, was none the worse for my use of the metal whisk.  Regardless of that, I think I just got lucky.

Incidentally, if you're wondering if I could have used only a spatula for the entire job, without whisking at all, the answer, I believe, is no.  You certainly can mix any two compatible substances (stuff that'll mix, that is, unlike gasoline and water), in any container that the substances in question won't destroy, using any implement - say, plaster of paris and water, mixed in a bird-bath, using a toothpick, for instance - but it's not always a good idea.

Pan gravy is an example of when it's a bad idea.  If I had used only the spatula, it would have been a matter of mash and stir, mash and stir, mash and stir, . . ., ad nauseum.  And, since the operation must take place under cooking conditions, the stuff would likely have burned before it was adequately mixed.  Whisking is necessary when you're making pan gravy, or any gravy or sauce, for that matter, that requires a cooking mixture of fat and flour.

Anyway, despite this little whisk snag, it ended well.  I did have to modify the ranging-top finishing instructions a little, by cooking at extremely low heat for two hours, but otherwise, I followed the recipe to the letter.  And I was pleasantly surprised by the consistency and texture.  My results were on a par with that of the oven-finished version, which I have heretofore held to be the superior of the two.  I'll have to reconsider my position on that matter now.

In summary, Smothered Steak cooked in an electric skillet works well.  If you do it in an inexpensive non-stick one, use a plastic whisk when making the pan gravy, so as not to damage the inexpensive non-stick coating.  Also, use the skillet's lowest temperature setting to finish the cooking, and finish for 2 to 2-1/2 hours, so that your tomato slices cook through.

And, oh, if you're interested, I served the Smothered Steak with rice (it's also good served over the rice) and candied carrots on the side.  We had ice cream for dessert.


What do you think?  I'm interested in hearing, so please comment.

Happy cooking!

Smothered Steak

Another way to enjoy Basic Fried Steak is to smother it with pan gravy and onions, and cook it, covered, in an oven or on the range-top.

Smothered Steak is similar to Country Fried Steak, but is cooked differently.  The main difference is that the steak finishes cooking in the pan gravy.

When you prepare Basic Fried Steak to be used in Smothered Steak, you don't cook the steak pieces to full doneness.  Also you fry over higher heat in order to get a crisp, golden-brown-with-dark-spots, as described in the Basic Fried Steak post, without cooking the steaks through.

Here's how it's done.

Smothered Steak

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1 recipe Basic Fried Steak, modified as described.
1 Spanish or yellow onion, sliced 1/4-inch thick.
4 C tap-water.
4 T vegetable oil.
All purpose flour.
Salt.
Pepper.

Prepare your Basic Fried Steak as described in the recipe, but fry the steak pieces over a hotter fire for less time.  The steaks are ready to be drained when they appear as described in the Basic Fried Steak recipe.  The juices that puddle on the steaks should be slightly pink in color at the point when you drain them.  This is because the steaks are underdone, which is exactly what you want.

Next, cook and drain the onion slices as described in the Country Fried Steak recipe (yesterday's post).

Now, make the pan gravy as described in the Country Fried Steak recipe, but don't thicken it completely.  It will continue to thicken as you continue.

When the gravy is ready, season it with salt and pepper (and/or your favorite other seasonings) to taste.

Arrange the steak pieces in the gravy and pile onion rings on each piece of steaks.  There should plenty of gravy in the pan to cover the steak and onions, but if there isn't, just spoon the gravy over the food.

Now, here are two ways you can finish cooking your Smothered Steak.  You can finish on the range-top by covering the skillet and simmering for 30-45 minutes, or you can finish in a 250-degree oven by covering the skillet and cooking for 1 to 1-1/2 hours (for what it's worth, I prefer finishing in the oven).

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Note: If you're finishing in the oven (haven't tried this on the range-top), you can add flavor, color, and texture to your Smothered Steak by the addition of tomato slices at the point before you finish cooking.  Just cut a big, ripe, juicy tomato (use your favorite variety) into 1/4-inch to 1/2-inch slices, and place the slices, one slice each, on tops tops of the steak/onion-ring stacks.  And, if you want to season the tomato slices, after they're in the pan, by applying light dusting of coarse-grind (preferably freshly ground) black pepper, go ahead.  Extra pepper doesn't hurt the flavor of Smothered Steak one bit.

That's all for now.

Happy cooking!

Country Fried Steak

Ever since I pushed the button to post yesterday's entry, I've been thinking about fried steak with brown pan gravy - also known as Country Fried Steak.  Even dreamed about it last night.  I've got to have some.  Soon.  Since I'll be cooking it, I'll share the recipe.

Country Fried Steak

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1 recipe Basic Fried Steak.
1 large Spanish or yellow onion.
2 T. vegetable oil
All-purpose flour
2 C. tap-water
Slice the onion into 1/4-inch disks.
Salt.
Pepper.

Make the Basic Fried Steak recipe, removing the "crunchies" but leaving as much oil as possible in the skillet.
You'll cook your onions in the same skillet

Cook the onion slices on a LOW fire, turning frequently, until they're translucent.  If the onions are ornery and want to stay disks, break them apart.  You want onion rings, not onion disks.

Remove the translucent onion rings, drain them, and set them aside.

Now for the brown pan gravy:

After you remove the onion from the skillet, pour in the vegetable oil.

Into the oil, mix (a wire egg whisk is my tool of choice for this) enough flour to make a paste the consistency of room-temperature peanut butter.  More flour makes for a heavier-bodied gravy; less for a lighter-bodied gravy.

With the skillet over the same LOW fire that cooked the onions, and stirring constantly to keep you pan gravy from burning, cook the oil/flour mixture gently until it's the color of peanut butter.  Reduce heat (or take skillet off the fire entirely).  After the pan has cooled somewhat, pour in the tap-water, all at once.  This cools the pan and stops the oil/flour mixture from further cooking.

Put the pan once again over a LOW fire, and while stirring constantly, cook the pan gravy until it thickens.

Season to taste with salt and pepper.

Arrange the steaks on a serving piece, and pile onion rings on top.  Pour the brown gravy over the steaks and onion rings, and serve.

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Notes:

1)  In my opinion, the onions alone give all the additional flavor I want most times, but I sometime like to vary the seasoning a bit by substituting seasoned salt, onion salt, garlic salt, etc., for the table salt.  I encourage you to experiment.
2) If you fry the steak in bacon grease, rather than vegetable oil, you still may (should?) use vegetable oil to make the pan gravy.  If you decide to go authentic all the way, however, be sure to measure 2 tablespoons of the bacon grease you use to make the gravy when it is in liquid (melted) form.  For what it's worth, I prefer to make my gravy with vegetable oil, canola oil in particular, regardless of what the steaks were fried in.

I hope you're successful at making this, and that you and yours enjoy it.

Incidentally, for the fat/flour mixture for the gravy, the "classically correct" proportions are given by weight: one unit-weight of fat to one unit-weight of flour.  If you own a digital kitchen scale with tare compensation (you can set a container, called a 'tare' in weighing circles, on the pan of the scale and press a certain button to 'zero the display') you can just weigh the oil and flour.  To do this, it's advisable to let the oil determine the amount of oil/flour mixture:  first, place a bowl, etc., on the scale pan and zero the  display.  Then measure out 2 tablespoons of oil into the container and weigh it.  Record the weight of the oil.  Next, place another container on the scale pan and zero the display again.  Now add flour to the container until the display reads the same as the weight recorded for oil.  Now, you could use flour as the weight basis, but if you do, you could end up with too much gravy (not always a bad thing), or too little (an utter tragedy, in my opinion).

So long for now.  Happy cooking!

Fried Steak, the Starting Place for Lots of Good Things to Eat

Plain, unadorned, garden-variety cubed steak - breaded, and fried in bacon grease - sounds boring, doesn’t it?  Well, it is pretty boring, at least to eat, but it surely was not boring for me the first time I cooked it.  It was, you see, the very first recipe I ever cooked.

My grandmother, Nannie, taught me how. After I had begged and pleaded with her for days, Nannie realized that her first-born grandson would cook, one way or another, come hell or high water, and that she’d better supervise, lest I burn either myself up, or the house down, or both.

Well, I was barely tall enough to see over the rim of the skillet on the range-top, so Nannie brought a step-stool over so I'd be ‘big enough’ to cook. But before I was to ply the ol’ skillet and spatula, there was a little prep work that needed to be gotten out of the way.  Nannie made it clear from the outset that if I wanted to learn to cook, I’d have to learn to do everything, including "pounding" the steak.

Pounding the steak? I apologize.  In the first paragraph of this post, I used the term ‘cubed steak’, implying that we just bought it that way. Well, we didn't.  I suppose ready-made cubed steak - round steak that has been tenderized by being run through the blades of a cubing machine - was available in those days, but Nannie would have none of it. A thrifty woman, she always bought round steak because it was cheaper than cubed steak, and tenderized it herself. This she did by pounding ¾-inch-thick pieces of steak to cut-with-a-fork tenderness using the edge of a saucer. For a long time, I thought this was the only way you got cubed steak.

Anyhow, since I had seen Nannie pound steak for this very recipe many times, I thought that I knew how it was done.  It looked easy and I’d be able to do it. Of course I was dead wrong. It wasn't, you see, that I couldn’t get the hang of chopping down on the steak with the edge of the saucer. My problem was that I couldn’t chop hard enough. Round steak’s really tough, and you have to beat the living dickens out of it to tenderize it. I think it's a good bet that that's why most folks these days (unless they're masochists, self-abusers, or otherwise-sanity-challenged individuals) buy their cubed steak already cubed.

In the end, Nannie wound up doing pretty much all of the pounding.  After being humbled by not being quite (hell! not anywhere near) big enough to pound the steak, I needed one in the ‘win’ column. I was so discouraged that if I hadn’t succeeded in seasoning the steak pieces and dredging them in flour, all by myself, my interest in cooking might have been nipped in the bud right then and there. But I did succeed, and now it was time to fry the steaks. Finally! This was the part I'd been waiting for.

Nannie moved my step-stool over to the stove, I climbed onto it, and Nannie lit the fire under her big, heavy, black cast-iron skillet. Next, Nannie reached for her bacon-drippings can on the back shelf of the range. In those days, everybody fried stuff - foods that lack sufficient fat of their own to do the job - in either bacon drippings or lard. Back then, you kept a can of bacon drippings within easy reach. Then, when you cooked bacon, after you done you just poured the drippings in the bacon-dripping can.

Nannie poured a little bacon grease into the skillet and my wait began.  Nannie watched the pan. I watched Nannie. My anticipation waxed and my patience waned with each passing moment. It seemed that that pan would just never get hot! After what seemed an eternity, Nannie nodded. It was time. I picked up a piece of seasoned and floured steak and carefully laid it in the hot fat. It sizzled. The aroma was heavenly.

After I had cooked the steaks, Nannie finished the cooking by making a brown pan gravy. We cleaned up the kitchen, sat down to Country Fried Steak for dinner, and it was to die for; just absolutely delicious.

On that day, almost fifty years ago in Albany, Georgia, my love and enthusiasm for cooking were born. Today, every time I cook Country Fried Steak, I get all teary-eyed. That might be on account of the onions I use in my pan gravy, but somehow I don’t think so.


Here’s the recipe (modernized, of course) I cooked that day.

Basic Fried Steak

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2 lbs. cubed beef steak, ½-inch to ¾-inch thick.
1 c. all-purpose flour.
Lawry’s® Seasoned Salt (or equivalent).
Black pepper
Onion powder
Vegetable oil.

Cut steaks up into serving-sized portions if desired.

Season the steak pieces, as liberally or sparingly as you want, on both sides with seasoned salt, black pepper, and/or onion powder. Or, you can use other seasonings entirely, or even no seasoning at all, if you’re of a mind to.

Dredge seasoned steak pieces in the flour; coat each piece evenly.

Now, into a heavy skillet, pour just enough oil to coat the bottom of the pan evenly.

On a LOW-to-MEDIUM fire, bring the pan and oil up to cooking temperature.

Fry the steaks, turning frequently, until the juices run clear. When done, the steak pieces should be mostly golden brown with some areas of darker brown.

Remove steak pieces and drain.

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Note:

- There will probably be (if there aren’t, your extremely unlucky) some cooked fragments of breading in the pan when you’re done. When I was a child, we called these morsels ‘crunchies’. Don’t throw them out. They’re delicious, and they’ll enhance the flavor and texture of any sauce or gravy you make as an accompaniment.

Suggestion:

- For a tasty and authentic - and slightly unhealthy, some would no doubt argue - twist, substitute bacon grease for the oil. Try it if you like. But you’re no fool. I don’t imagine that you and your family eat like this every day (I and mine certainly don’t), so my guess is that you probably have some leeway here.

My best to you and yours.  I wish you happy (and successful!) cooking!