Once home, I didn’t really know what to do with it, so I looked up what others have done to get some ideas. I was originally thinking of making something like the quinoa salad with it, but then I saw that many people used it in stews and soups. I decided to use a handful of the ingredients people used in stews, but make it dry instead of soupy. And I had a cut of steak that I had to use, so let’s bring some meat to this party.

Filling and tasty, but yet at the same time not heavy.

This dish was surprisingly simultaneously both light and filling–which fortunately was what I was going for. I didn’t feel like I had eaten a lot, but I was quickly sated. I cooked the barley in beef broth to give it more body and flavor. I also tossed in some mushrooms for some extra depth and the asparagus provided a bit of sharp vegetable-y contrast. A few ounces of steak also helped fill out the meal and give a sense of eating something a bit more… well… meaty.

You don’t need much steak at all though, I like to think of the steak as an accent to the barley salad rather than as the main attraction. My roommate and I actually split one strip steak and still had a bit left over. I suppose we could have finished off the rest, but neither of us actually felt hungry for more afterwards. I suppose that meant that I accomplished my goal. *pats self of the back*

This recipe isn’t complicated to make either. One large pot for all the vegetables. One small pot to cook the barley. One skillet to sear the steak. And everything can be done in the time it takes the barley to cook.

I often prefer my steak more on the rare side of medium-rare. Just wanted to throw that out there before anybody thinks it's undercooked. It's exactly how I like it.

Barely meat barley salad
Serves 4 (I only prepared one steak because I was making it for two people. The leftovers went into the fridge and I’ve been eating those without any more steak. It’s fine on it’s own.)
Ingredients
1 pint sliced cremini mushrooms
3 carrots, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1/2 lb asparagus, cut into no larger than 1-inch segments
1 cup barley (pearled barley)
2 1/2 cups beef broth (low sodium is preferred)
1 small steak (flank, skirt, whatever you like)
olive oil
salt, pepper

Directions
Barley
1. Rinse the barley several times in cold water until the water runs fairly clear.
2. Bring 2 1/2 cups beef broth to a boil in a medium pot. Add the barley and return to a simmer. Reduce the heat to low, cover and cook for 40-45 minutes, until the liquid is absorbed.
Vegetables
1. Place a large pot over medium heat. Add about 2 tsps olive oil and then the chopped onion. Cook for about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Add the carrot and cook for 10 minutes more. Add the mushrooms and cook for about 15 minutes more. Add the asparagus and cook for about 5 minutes more. (Stir occasionally during this entire process.)
2. Add the cooked barley and mix everything in the large pot.
Steak
1. Place a skillet with a base large enough to hold your steak over medium high heat. Salt and pepper the steak. Add about 1 tsp of olive oil to the pan. Add the steak and allow to cook 3-6 minutes until it is nicely seared. The cooking time will depend on the thickness of the steak. A good rule of thumb for a medium to medium-rare steak is to cook it, without flipping, until you see juice rise from the top of the steak. Note about how long it took to do that, then flip the steak over and cook for that same about of time. If you need more precision, use a probe thermometer: medium-rare is 130-135 F, medium is 140-145F.
2. Remove the steak to a (warmed) plate and cover with foil. Allow to rest for the juices to settle for about 3 minutes, then cut into strips.
Serving
I broke out every other step into a category, so why not this one?
1. Pile the barley salad onto a plate and set the steak strips over the top.
2. Serve with a full-bodied red wine :)

I need to make more chimichurri

There is also something else a bit unusual going on here: quail eggs. I was recently told that my local egg supplier, Box Turtle Meadow Farm, not only had chicken and duck eggs, but also had quail eggs available! Obviously, I was eager to try them. When I finally got my hands on a few, I couldn’t think of what to do with them. As I mentioned in the first paragraph, steak with chimichurri was already on my mind. So I decided to put the two together. Steak and eggs isn’t uncommon, but steak and quail eggs… With chimichurri… Now that’s going to be a feast.

I rounded off the meal with some sweet glazed carrots and some mashed potatoes (with some sweet potato added for extra flavor).

I’ll try to post more information about quail eggs in the coming months as I play around with them and learn some more about their characteristics and how they can be used. I’ve already got a few dishes in mind and am looking forward to trying them out. If you have trouble locating quail eggs for this recipe, try looking in farmer’s markets or in Asian markets.

Anybody want some dinner?

Steak with chimichurri and quail egg

Ingredients for the chimichurri
Makes about a cup
1 bunch Italian flat-leaf parsley
2-3 cloves garlic
salt
lemon juice (about a whole lemon)
1/4 c red wine vinegar
2/3 cup olive oil (up to a cup may be needed)

Directions for the chimichurri
To prep the parsley, grab the bunch and chop off the stems. It’s fine if there are still sections of stem, just grab the bunch of parsley and cut about 1/2 to 1/3 of the way down.
Food Processor Directions:
1. Pulse everything gently in the food processor until minced. Do not just run it until it becomes a paste. Paste=bad. Minced=good.
2. Set aside until ready to use. Can be made a few hours ahead of time.
Non-food Processor Directions (for people like me):
1. Mince the parsley into a fine, uh, mince. I did about half the parsley as a fine mince and the rest and only lightly minced to provide a bit of contrast in size.
2. Mince the garlic, add it to the parsley. Add a pinch of salt, lemon juice, and vinegar. Add about 3/4 of the oil you have and whisk together, adding more as needed. The thickness of the chimichurri is up to you. I made mine loose enough to pour and easily whisk, but thick enough that little piles would stand up under their own weight (like in the photos).
3. Set aside until ready to use. Can be made a few hours ahead of time.

Ingredients for steak and quail eggs
steak (I used shoulder steak this time because of a good sale, but NY Strip is my favorite cut for great flavor and texture)
2 quail eggs per cut of steak
vegetable oil
salt and pepper

Directions for steak and quail eggs
1. Allow steak to come to room temperature. Season lightly with salt and a little pepper. Rub lightly with vegetable oil.
2. Heat a cast iron or regular skillet over medium high heat.
3. When hot, add about 2 teaspoons of vegetable oil to to skillet. Then add the steaks and sear the first side. The cooking time will depend on the thickness. For a medium-rare steak that is about 3/4 of an inch thick, cook for about a minute-and-a-half to two minutes a side.
4. After cooking the first side, flip the steaks. In the space in the pan surrounding the steaks, start frying the quail eggs. They are small and will cook fast. Once the white sets, gently lift them and place them on top of the steak until the steak finishes cooking. The steak will protect them from overcooking.
5. Using a spatula (gently, so the eggs don’t slide off), move the steaks to a resting tray to allow the juices to settle. A plate with an inverted saucer on it or a cooling rack placed in a cookie sheet work well. Allow to rest for at least a minute.
6. Serve with the chimichurri either on the side or spooned across the top of the steak.

Steak and eggs, foodspot style

Rib Eye Steak

Ever since William introduced me to Good Eats, I’ve been hooked.  I’ve seen almost every episode, and credit the show with some of the most useful culinary instruction I’ve received.  Whenever I make a new dish, I usually start with the Good Eats version first to help learn all the necessary techniques and to learn to pick the proper ingredients.  Alton Brown just released a new book Good Eats: The Early Years, which has selected recipes, trivia, and pictures from each episode up to episode 80 (which is most of the way through season 6).  This will eventually make up a trilogy of books, with the eventual release of 2 other books.  The release of this book gave me an idea to revisit the early episodes of Good Eats, and to make a recipe from each episode to post on the blog.  This leads me to the first episode: Steak Your Claim.

Searing the 1st Side

Steak Your Claim has an amazing technique for cooking steak that most people haven’t tried at home.  Instead of using the grill, Alton opted for what he refers to as “Black Gold” or a cast iron pan.  It involves getting the pan blazing hot and searing the steak on both sides and then finishing it the rest of the way in the oven.  It yields a delcious, brown crust on the outside of the steak while the inside remains juicy.  The cooking time also only takes about 5 minutes for medium rare, so it hard to beat a perfectly cooked steak in minimal time.  This cooking method does produced a decent amount of smoke, so I would recommend opening some windows in your house before you drop the steak in the pan.

Searing the 2nd Side

Ingredients:
1 Boneless Rib Eye Steak, 1 1/2 Inch Thick
Canola Oil
Salt and Pepper

Directions:
1. Place a 12 inch Cast Iron Skillet in the oven and preheat the oven to 500 F.  Allow the steaks to warm to room temperature.
2. When the oven preheats to 500F remove the pan from the oven and place on a burner over high heat for 5 minutes.
3. During this time, lightly coat the steak with canola oil and salt and pepper both sides.
4. Place the steak in the pan and cook for 30 seconds without touching the steak.  Flip the steak over and cook for another 30 seconds.
5. Place the pan directly in the oven and cook for 2 minutes for medium rare (3 minutes for medium).  Flip the steak and cook for 2 more minutes for medium rare (3 minutes for medium).  The internal temperature should be around 135F for medium rare and 140F for medium (the temperature will rise some while resting).
6. Place the steak in the draining rig composed of a bowl, collander, and lid (see picture) and allow to rest for 5 minutes (This allows for the juices to be retained for a sauce).  Dig in and enjoy!

Draining Rig

Street Asado (click for bigger image)

I quickly learned that beef is king here. Parrilla restaurants are everywhere. I even came across a guy in the street grilling out on the sidewalk. Not even in a restaurant or anything–he was just making lunch. (See after the jump for the photo of this guy’s lunch—Bonus points to anyone who can name all the meats in the Street Asado.)
And it’s not just beef that is popular, anything that can be grilled is fair game. All kinds of animals–goat, lamb, cow, pig, poultry, fowl–, vegetables and fruits are all options for an Argentine in front of a parrilla.

I would like to introduce you to the Argentine way of grilling, the asado.

Asado

Everyone has seen the round Weber Grills used in the US. These are perfectly capable machines and can grill a good steak, but the Argentines have a method that I prefer. I always seem to have a problems grills in the US. I feel that I cannot regulate the heat as much as I would like and adding more coals to a lit grill is always an issue. The resourceful Argentines of course figured out a way around this by using a multistage process and an open cooking area.

Some terminology and a disclaimer first. The ‘parrilla’ is the physical grill and ‘asado’ is the method of grilling. Parrilla is also a general term used for restaurants whose meals center around the grill. As for the disclaimer, my experience with asados is pretty limited, so if anyone has better knowledge of the process or wants to correct me, please do. I’d welcome any comments or corrections (or even an invitation to your place so you can demonstrate the proper technique over an asado!).

Preparing the Parrilla

Can you name all the foods? Click for a bigger picture.

As you can see from the photos, the parrilla is quite large. Even in the photo of the guy cooking on the street, he is taking more room than you would be using in the US. This is to accommodate the multistage method. The stages involve control of the heat for the fire and it moves the material from the initial burn to the spent ash/coals. This parrilla is actually modeled after the Uruguayan style. The difference between the two is that the Uruguayan version has a separate metal grill that you stoke to make the embers fall. The Argentines are not as picky, you make the fire directly on the bricks on the left side and push them to the cooking area when they are ready (alternatively, you can prepare the fire directly under the grill). The photo of the street asado is more traditionally Argentine of the two parrillas. The premise remains the same though.

Notice the burning fire and the embers ready to be used collecting below.

1. The first stage is to burn the wood. As I understand, many people try to use wood instead of charcoal. Charcoal is available and sometimes used, but wood is typically the choice heat source. All freshly burning material is in the first area.
2. The second stage is a holding area for the hot coals/embers.
3. The third stage is the cooking area. This is where the hot coals are spread under the food being cooked. On many parrillas the grill grate itself is suspended on a chain and can be raised and lowered to help regulate the proximity to the heat source.
4. The fourth area is for the spent coals.

The wood from the first stage has been consumed. The embers are ready to be used in stage two. Embers are spread under the lowered grill in stage three.

This process ensures you always have a fresh and constant supply of hot coals to use and gets them out of the way quickly and easily when they are used up. I find this way allows for more control over the level of heat for the cuts of meat. You can directly adjust the amount of coals on the fly. This also allows you to leave the meat in place and not move it around trying to find best area on the grill for it.

Typically, asados last several hours and many different cuts of meat are served. When my friend hosted one at his house, we ate:

From the Grill

Potatoes wrapped in foil added to the embers

• Picaña (a Brazilian cut that is very popular in Argentina now)
• Thin Flank (Vacio)
• Chorizos
• Sweet Blood Sausage (Morzilla Dulce)
• Pork Ribs (Pechito de Cerdo)
• Baked Potatoes
• Grilled Corn

Other

• two kinds of salad
• baguette
• Ice cream from Freddo

Unfortunately, we planned this on short notice and could not get good mollejas (sweetbread). We had eaten some a few days before, but I was looking forward to grilling some myself. Maybe next time.

Leftovers