Mmm... Steak

Those of you who have known me a long time know that I wasn't always a meat eater. My parents raised us without "red" meat, but we did eat fish, poultry, and occasional bacon. I was a true vegetarian for a while too. But my membership has lapsed and I haven't renewed. Disapprove all you want, but I really like eating meat. And luckily, in Eugene, it's easy to find meat that is raised as naturally as possible. Yes, "all natural" cows still graze on public land, consume a lot of water, etc. but it is far better than the alternative, and I like supporting businesses who do it the better way.

Anyway... We got some Painted Hills ribeye steaks, on sale at the Market of Choice, last week. We had to wait most of the week for the weather to be nice enough to grill, but yesterday it was. So we fired up the charcoal, slapped these huge marbled steaks down and cooked them up. Other than a little salt and pepper, I didn't do anything to them.

Alongside, we grilled up some asparagus. Those I tossed with some lemon olive oil, salt and pepper before grilling.

Given my late coming to the meat world, I haven't eaten a lot of steaks in my life. And I don't often keep track of the cuts, or know much about one over another. But this ribeye... WOW!!!! It was SO flavorful! Maybe it was because it is a fattier steak, and maybe it was just cooked to perfection (medium-well in this case), but it was amazing.

The asparagus had just a hint of lemon flavor to it, and we cooked it just until it still had its crunch.

For wine we could have gone with something heartier, but we really wanted some Pinot Noir. The Marylhurst Vista Hills 2007 that Rose and I picked up in January was perfect. It stood up well to the rich but simple dinner, and complemented it nicely. We got lucky! Yum!

Grilling in April

It was a pretty nice day here in Eugene. It started out chilly and ended up around 70. So we decided to fire up the grill for the first time this year. I had picked up some chicken sausages (two basil, two lemon) from the Market of Choice this morning - intending them for next weekend, but hey, no time like the present!

But what to have as a side?... We had some cauliflower leftover from last week's curry, and I walked over to the local market and picked up some broccoli too. I mixed these together with a little bit of lemon olive oil, salt and pepper and we were good to go.

We cooked the sausages a bit first, then moved them to the side and put the veggies in our little grilling pan to cook. They got brown pretty fast so I had to keep stirring them.

When it seemed like everything was done (so hard to tell on a grill!) we ate the sausages with mustard and homemade relish (canned in 2008) - no buns, and nice crunchy and slightly lemony broccoli and cauliflower. We also had a very nice Pinot Gris from Panther Creek.

By the time we ate (outside on the patio) we had to have on long sleeve shirts, but it was still wonderful out and a nice spring meal.

Chicken parmesan dream

Last week, we made something pretty amazing - and I say "we" because hubby played a major role.

First things first, though: the olive oil.
I heard recently (over twitter) that a new store had opened downtown called "Olive Grand". It's an olive oil store, so naturally I stopped in. What a sweet place! It's the first business venture for this couple, and they have a whole store filled with different styles and flavors of wonderful olive oil, as well as many types of flavored balsamic vinegars. I was in heaven. The folks were very nice and I got to taste a variety of wonderful, rich flavors. I couldn't decide what to buy, so I rashly decided on the lemon olive oil. I got a small bottle - filled directly from a large steel vat - for $13.50. Ouch. But what a delicious novelty!

So, here's the question: What do you use lemon olive oil for? We tried it with some balsamic and dipped olive bread in it. Delicious!

Then, a few days later hubby had the dinner idea of chicken parmesan (something we never make). In the morning, I decided the chicken breasts needed a marinade, so I poured some lemon olive oil in a bag with them (not too much!), added a few cloves of chopped garlic and some salt and pepper and let them sit all day.

To cook the chicken, hubby followed my suggestions: He started by broiling the breasts on each side for about 5 minutes each in a glass casserole. Then he dumped some canned (organic at least!) marinara sauce over them and baked at 350 for 15 or 20 minutes. Then he added a whole bunch of freshly grated/shredded parmesan cheese and let that get nice and melty.

This is when I got home from a late meeting and rejoiced.

I quickly cooked up some egg noodles to put the chicken and sauce over. When I cut into the chicken, the aroma of lemon and garlic oozed out. Surprise! The subtle flavor of lemon permeated the chicken, and mixed well with the marinara and cheese. The noodles provided a good secondary sauce-delivery-mechanism. Oh yeah, we had some salad too. It was all divine.

This was more than a week ago and I can still taste it. I highly recommend all of the above!