Grilled Steaks with Ancho Butter and Rosemary Roasted Potatoes

The Griller is really getting the hang of it. Another steak grilled to perfection. This one was marinated in molasses, sherry vinegar and ancho chile powder. Topped with a compound chile butter, it really was fantastic. We had 4 rib steaks. Wasn't sure if they rather have plain steak or not. So two had the marinade, two were grilled plain, with only salt and pepper. All were prime. All were fantastic. We each had a large piece of both. But the two in the marinade was just a little more fantastic, thumbs up and definitely a keeper. And the extra compound butter is now in the freezer. I'll try it on vegetables, fish or chicken. It's a nice touch. Not to sweet, not to spicy. Added a nice, rich flavor.

Grilled Steak with Rosemary Roasted Potatoes and Grilled Asparagus on the side.

Grilled Steaks with Ancho Butter

adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook

Source: Food & Wine, recipe by Robert Del Grande

 Printable Recipe

Ancho butter:
2 tablespoons ancho chile powder
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/4 medium onion, coarsely chopped
1 shallot, coarsely chopped
6 garlic cloves, peeled

2 sticks (1/2 pound) unsalted butter, softened
juice of one lime
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 tablespoon pure maple syrup

Steaks:
1/3 cup olive oil
1/4 cup unsulphured molasses
1/4 cup sherry vinegar
2 teaspoons ancho chile powder
4 1 1/2-pound bone-in rib-eye steaks, about 3 inches thick
salt and freshly ground pepper

Heat the olive oil in a small skillet. Add the onion and garlic and cook over low heat, stirring, until tender and lightly caramelized. Remove from the heat and let cool.

Put the ancho powder, onions, garlic, lime juice,and maple syrup in a food processor and pulse until chopped. Add the softened butter and pulse to thoroughly combine. Put the compound butter in a bowl and refrigerate until the steaks are ready.

Light a grill. Season both sides of the steaks with salt and pepper. In a bowl combine the olive oil, molasses, vinegar and chile powder. Brush the steaks on both sides with some of the mixture. Grill the steaks to desired doneness. Brush both sides with more of the molasses mixture. Grill for another minute, then transfer to a platter and let rest for 10 minutes. Serve with the ancho butter.
*Freeze the leftover butter to use on vegetables, fish, chicken or meat.

Rosemary Roasted Potatoes

2 pounds baby Yukon Gold potatoes, cut in half, par-boiled on stove or microwave until almost tender
rosemary sprigs, cut in 1-inch pieces
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
salt and freshly ground black pepper
     
Preheat the oven to 400°.

Drain the potatoes and pat them dry.

Spread the potatoes and rosemary sprigs on a rimmed baking sheet. Drizzle with the olive oil, season with salt and black pepper and toss to coat. Roast for 45 minutes, stirring a few times, until the potatoes are sizzling and browned.

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Spatchcocked again...

I love this technique. I was a little skeptical that it would take a lot less time to cook, but it worked. Definitely cut the cooking time down a lot, and it was perfectly juicy and cooked through. My normal my roast chicken is iffy. Even with the silly popup timer and an instant read, my roast chicken most of the time comes in two styles, overcooked and undercooked. But not any more. Perfectly done.

Decided to be somewhat adventurous this time and took out the breast bone and the ribs. Pounded it a little, too. Flat chicken. Perfectly roasted. Easy to serve and slice. This recipe from Food52 had fantastic flavor. I adapted it a little, using lemon juice, leeks and a pinch of crushed red pepper in the compound butter, and roasted teeny potatoes in the pan to soak up the flavors.

And on the bright side, yesterday's dinner is today's pulled chicken sandwich.

Spatchcocked Roast Chicken with Lemon and Leek Compound Butter

Source: Food52

adapted by There's Always Thyme to Cook

Printable Recipe

4 tablespoons softened butter
zest and juice of one lemon

1 leek, sliced, white part only
3 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 teaspoon thyme leaves, roughly chopped (I used dried)
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard

big pinch of crushed red pepper
salt and freshly ground black pepper, to taste
1 large chicken

For the compound butter: 

In a food processor, combine the butter, lemon zest, juice, garlic, thyme, mustard, leek, slat and pepper.

For the chicken:
Preheat the oven to 425° F.

Remove the gizzards from the chicken and discard. Rinse the chicken. Pat the chicken dry with paper towels and set it on a cutting board. Flip it onto its breast and using kitchen shears, remove the backbone by cutting carefully down each side of the bone. The entire inside of the chicken will be exposed when you’re finished. You can also pull out the breast bone, if you want to, or flip the chicken over and press down hard to crack it, the chicken will lay flatter this way.

Sprinkle the cavity with salt and pepper, and then flip the chicken over so that it lies flat. Trim any excess deposits of fat from around the cavity and tail end. Gently slide your fingers under the skin and ease it away from the meat, around both sides of the breast and both thighs and legs. Carefully smear the compound butter, underneath the skin, being careful not to tear, if you can. Reserve about a tablespoon of the butter, and then spread the reserved butter evenly over the skin, followed by a sprinkle of more salt and pepper.

Lay the chicken flat in a shallow roasting pan just large enough to accommodate it.

 Roast for about 30 minutes, then baste. Decrease the heat to 375°. Put potatoes or whatever vegetables you like around the chicken to roast. Cook for another 30 minutes, basting once again in the middle, and continue to roast until the chicken is done. Let the chicken sit for a few minutes before carving; serve with the pan juices, the potatoes and some crusty bread for sopping up the juices.

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Roasted Garlic

I'm on a roasting kick lately and this time it was garlic. Halloween coming up and all, it'll keep the vampires away.  Hey, I roasted so much garlic, it'll keep EVERYONE away!

I usually just buy peeled garlic and freeze it for when I need it, but my neighbor went to the market and they were having some sort of cooking demonstration using organic garlic. It was farm grown locally on Long Island. He liked the demonstration so much he went a little garlic crazy and bought way too much. So he stopped by and dropped off a bunch for us.

We like garlic, we don't love it. Well, we love a little garlic, not overkill.  I didn't want it to go bad, it really was so nice, much nicer than the shriveled, dried, green in the middle, yucky stuff you get at the grocery store sometimes. So I googled what to do with it. And I decided that roasting it would be the best option. It would bring out the sweetness and cut the bite. And that's just what I did!

Roasted Garlic!

I think I'm in love. It's sweet, it delicious and it's spreadable. And I want it to last. So I mixed it up with a stick of butter. Rolled it in parchment and now I'll have a garlic butter sauce any time I want. Just store in the freezer and cut a slice or two any time I need some!

It's great mixed into pasta, on top of a steak, spread on a toasted baguette, on roasted vegetables. Endless possibilities!  Mine is in the freezer, just waiting until I decide what exactly what I want to do with it. And figure out exactly what my picky one will want to eat!

In the meantime, it made a really nice garlic toast!

Roasted Garlic and Roasted Garlic Butter
Printable Recipe

2 heads of garlic
1 tablespoon olive oil
salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Slice about a third off the top, pointed end of the garlic bulbs. Remove any loose paper from whole heads of garlic as you can, don't break apart the cloves.

Place it on a large piece of aluminum foil and drizzle it with the olive oil.

Bring the foil over the sides of the garlic and twist to seal it, not too tight. Place it in a small baking dish and roast in the oven for about 45 minutes. Bake until the garlic is soft and easily pierced with a thin-bladed knife. Squeeze the roasted garlic from the clove. Wait until it cools a bit, then squeeze the cloves out. Or use a fork!

To make garlic compound butter: leave a stick of unsalted butter on the counter while the garlic roasts, so it will come to room temperature. When the garlic has roasted and cooled a bit, squeeze the cloves into a bowl, and take the room temperature butter and mash it all together. Take the mixture and plop it on a piece of parchment, wax paper or plastic wrap, then roll it up into a log. Twist the ends to tighten it up. Throw it in the freezer and slice off a piece whenever you need it. Use 3 to 6 cloves of roasted garlic per stick of butter, depending how strong you like the flavor. I used 5 very small cloves to one stick of butter.

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Grilling: Salmon with Garlic and Lime Butter Sauce

ok, so it happened. We ate somewhat healthy tonight. Not really sure what came over us, but there was a request for salmon. The miracle would be if it was unanimous, but it wasn't. Miss Picky had hot dogs. I went searching online for some nice way to do the salmon and not stink up the house! Grilled Salmon with Lime Butter. Got a lot of rave reviews on Epicurious. So I tried it. It got rave reviews here, too! I added a little bit of shallots and some fresh jalapeno to the sauce. Delicious. Fantastic. Definitely a keeper. Served it with grilled Zucchini sprinkled with Penzey's Mural of Flavor. Good stuff. and some frozen Tater Tots. I said dinner was good, I didn't say perfect :)

Grilled Salmon with Garlic and Lime Butter Sauce 
Source: Ian Knauer - Gourmet, July 2006
adapted There's Always Thyme to Cook
Printable Recipe

6 (6-oz) pieces center-cut salmon fillet (about 1 inch thick) with skin
1 teaspoon finely grated fresh lime zest
6 tablespoons lime butter sauce (recipe below)

Prepare grill for cooking over medium-hot charcoal or moderate heat for gas grilling.

Season salmon all over with salt and pepper, then grill, flesh side down, on lightly oiled grill rack (close cover for gas grilling) about 4 - 5 minutes. Turn fillets over and grill (close cover for gas grilling) until just cooked through, 4 to 6 minutes more. Sprinkle fillets with zest and top each with about a tablespoon lime butter sauce.

NOTE: If you aren't able to grill outdoors, you can grill the salmon indoors in a hot lightly oiled well-seasoned ridged grill pan over moderately high heat. Or even in the oven, but leave the "Grilled" off the title :) The sauce is really good on vegetables! You can also use lemon instead of limes, and add chopped shallots. I tend to add shallots to everything. I added some fresh jalapeno, too!

Garlic Lime Butter Sauce
1 large garlic clove, chopped
1/4 cup fresh lime juice
1/2 teaspoon salt (more or less to taste)
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, melted
1/2 fresh jalapeno
1/2 shallot, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon fresh lime zest

Melt the butter in a saute pan with the shallots and the garlic. Don't cook it, just heat it all up until melted. Purée the lime juice, jalapeno, salt, and pepper in a blender or food processor until smooth. With motor running, add melted butter and blend until emulsified, about 30 seconds. or pour melted butter, garlic and shallot in the food processor and whiz until emulsified.

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