Archive Recipe of the Week: Beef and Guinness Stew or Pot Pie

St. Patrick’s Day is just a week away and I have nothing to report that is either green or Guinness-y. That just leaves me the perfect opportunity to give some love to this Beef and Guinness Stew that I tend to serve every year.

In the past, I’ve presented this as a pot pie because I served it in individual stew bowls with a puff pastry lid. You wouldn’t have to do that. Well, you wouldn’t have to, but I highly recommend it. In fact, you could do that with just about any thick stew. Just give it a pastry covering of some kind and you have pot pie.

This is just such a good stew/pot pie, however, that I don’t want you to miss out on it’s fabulous beefy and peppery flavors just because you don’t have pastry skills or some kind of frozen or refrigerated pastry on hand. It’s usually pretty easy for me to pass up a beef dish, but when that beef is flavorfully slow-cooked, I’m in trouble. It’s also easy for me to pass up a bottle of beer, but when you give the dark, rich flavor of Guinness to a slow cooked beef stew, we’re talking about something different entirely. Something so good it’s worthy of a celebration.

Don’t let the brined green peppercorns in the ingredient list scare you. They’re just black peppercorns in a younger stage bottled in brine. They’re delicious and if you haven’t tried them, I’d recommend getting your hands on a bottle to use in this stew. In fact, I can’t think of any other recipe I use them in and I still find them to be worth the purchase. You can find them near the capers (and pickles, etc.) in supermarkets.

And – trust me – it’s worth saving out one bottle of Guinness just to make this stew. Celebrate responsibly!

Beef and Guinness Stew or Pot Pie
Modified from Gourmet magazine

Making this stew into a pot pie is optional, but really good.

2 lb boneless beef chuck
2 Tbs all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
½ tsp black pepper
2 Tbs canola or vegetable oil, divided
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 ½ Tbs tomato paste
1 ½ cups beef broth
1 (11.2 ounce) bottle Guinness or other Irish stout
1 Tbs Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp drained brined green peppercorns, coarsely chopped
2 fresh thyme sprigs or ½ teaspoon dried thyme
1 pound peeled potatoes, cut into 1-inch cubes
½ (17.3 ounce) package puff pastry (1 sheet) (or more if needed), thawed

1. Pat the beef dry with paper towels if it is damp on the surface. Cut the beef into 1-2 inch cubes. Combine the flour, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Add the cubed beef and toss to coat with the flour mixture.

2. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large pot, such as a Dutch oven, over medium heat. Add the beef in one layer and cook, turning to brown on all sides. Remove the browned beef from the pot and place in a clean bowl or on a clean plate. Repeat with the remaining beef, adding more of the oil as needed.

3. When all the beef has been browned, add the onion to the pan. Cook over medium heat 3 minutes. Add garlic and ½ cup beef broth. Scrape up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot.

4. Stir in the tomato paste and cook 1 minute. Add the beef and any juices that may have accumulated in the bowl. Add the remaining 1 cup broth, Guinness, Worcestershire sauce, brined green peppercorns and thyme.

5. Bring to a simmer. Cover and simmer 1 hour. Add the potatoes. Simmer about 1 hour more or until the beef is very tender. Remove the lid for the last 30 minutes to thicken the stew if desired. Remove the stems from the thyme sprigs if you used fresh thyme. The stew can be made ahead of time or served without a pastry covering at this point.

6. Preheat the oven to 450 F. Spoon stew into 4 oven-proof single-serving crocks or soup bowls. Cut the puff pastry sheet into 4 squares. (You can cut it smaller or larger, or use more than one sheet, depending on the size of the bowls you are using.) Place 1 sheet of puff pastry on top of each filled bowl. Gently press to adhere to the sides of the bowl. Cut 2 to 3 slits in the top of the pastry to allow steam to escape as it bakes.

7. Place the pot pies on a baking sheet for easy transfer to the oven. Bake at 450 F 10-15 minutes or until the puff pastry is well browned. Remove from the oven and let stand 5-10 minutes. The stew under the pastry will be very hot.

Makes about 4 servings

Other recipes like this one: Beef Stew with Red Wine and Mushrooms, Beef stew with Tomatillos and Poblano Chiles, Beer Cheese Soup with Bratwurst

One year ago: Orange Butter Cookies

Beef Empanada Pot Pie

When posting another of my husband’s favorite recipes, I referred to my great aunt’s bridal shower advice to cook my new husband’s favorite meal every once in a while as a surprise. Well, I don’t really do surprises so well, and I’m always trying new recipes, so I was in danger of neglecting that very good advice. I recently devised a list of several favorite recipes, however, and I’m trying to make one of those recipes each week. Some are simple (thank goodness for simple tastes!), but some, like this Beef Empanada Pot Pie, require a little more forethought and preparation.

 

This is a rich and savory pot pie, originally from the pages of Cooking Light magazine. I’m afraid I may have “un-lightened” it somewhat, adding more flour to a filling that I though was too runny and adding more olives. (I wish “light” didn’t have to mean skimping on the olives.) This makes a big stew with a flavorful crust that can feed us most of the week if we let it. It’s very beefy, but there are also a lot of diced potatoes that make the filling very, well, filling.

Speaking of those potatoes, I highly recommend cutting them into very small chunks so they cook through and aren’t unpleasantly hard. I used thin-skinned potatoes this time around, and they only needed to be scrubbed, but you can peel yours if you wish. Actually I had made this potpie just a week before I made the one in these photos, which is an unprecedented level of repeat around here, but it wasn’t until I got it into the oven, crust and all, that I realized that I had left the potatoes out entirely. I hadn’t even cleaned and chopped them. Total neglect. (The pot pie was actually very good without them, really, but it didn’t stretch to as many servings without the potatoes’ extra bulk.)

 

This is a delicious meal, and, although I can’t handle quite so much beef, nor as large a serving as my husband, I like it almost as much as he does. It’s like a stewy-er version of a perky, savory, slightly spicy empanada with an empanada crust on top rather than enfolding the filling. I reserve it for meals in the colder months, since it requires some hot oven time and is so filling and hearty. Since the colder days seem to be here to stay for a while, Beef Empanada Pot Pie goes on the “Deserving Husband’s Favorites” list for a while. I can’t help it if I really enjoy this one, too.

Other recipes from the archives on the “Deserving Husband’s Favorites” list:

Peanutty Noodles

Italian Chickpeas
Soup Beans
Spaghetti Pie
Beef and Guinness Pot Pie

 

Beef Empanada Pot Pie

Adapted from Cooking Light magazine

I use the dark Mexican beer, Negra Modello, for this pot pie. I also usually use a fairly lean ground beef and do not feel I need to drain any fat after browning it. If yours is less lean, you can drain some of it off before adding the vegetables to the pot.

for the crust:

1 cup all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon chili powder
¼ teaspoon fine salt
¼ cup cold butter, cut into small pieces
3-5 tablespoons ice water
1 tablespoon cider vinegar

for the filling:

1 pound ground beef
1 ½ pounds diced potato, peeled if desired (about 4 cups)
1 cup chopped onion
½ cup chopped bell pepper
2 large garlic cloves, minced
1 small fresh chile pepper, minced
1 ½ teaspoons dried oregano
1 ½ teaspoons chili powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
½ teaspoon fine salt
½ cup all-purpose flour
½ cup beer (I use a dark Mexican beer)
1 (10.5 ounce) can beef consommé
1 (14.5 ounce) can diced tomatoes
¼ cup chopped green olives (pimiento-stuffed are fine)
1 tablespoon cider vinegar

1. To make the crust: combine the flour, cumin, chili powder and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse to combine. Add the butter and process until the butter is in very small, flour-coated pieces.

2. Add the vinegar and about 3 tablespoons ice water. Pulse until the mixture just begins to come together in a ball, adding more water as needed.

3. Turn out the dough onto a surface lined with a large sheet of plastic wrap. Press mixture gently into a rectangle and cover with another sheet of plastic wrap. Roll the dough between the plastic wrap sheets into an oval or rectangle roughly the size of the dish you plan on using to make the potpie, about 12 inches by 8 inches. Refrigerate until ready to use.

4. Preheat oven to 400 F. Place the ground beef in a very large pot or Dutch oven over medium heat. Cook until the meat is browned. Drain excess fat from the meat if desired and return the meat to the pan.

5. Add the onion, bell pepper and potato. Cook about 10 minutes or until the onions and peppers are tender. Add the chile and garlic and cook about 30 seconds more. Stir in the oregano, chili powder, cumin and salt. Add the flour and cook, stirring for about 1 minute.

6. Add the beer and scrape the browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the beef consommé and tomatoes. Cook, stirring often, for a few minutes or until the liquid has thickened. Stir in the olives and cider vinegar.

7. Pour the mixture into a deep casserole dish, approximately 11 inches by 7 inches. (I used a 3-quart oval casserole.) Remove the plastic wrap from one side of the crust. Place that side of the crust down onto the filling. Remove the remaining sheet of plastic wrap. Fit the crust to the sides of the dish, folding over as needed. With a sharp knife, make 3-4 slashes in the crust.

8. Bake at 400 for 35 minutes or until the crust is golden brown and the filling is bubbly. Cool 10 minutes before serving. Cover and refrigerate leftovers for re-heating.

Makes 6-8 servings.

 

Other recipes like this one: Beef and Guinness Pot Pie, Beef Stew with Tomatillos and Roasted Poblano Chiles

One year ago: Black Bean Soup with Salsa

Kicking off the Season

I have neither a ticket to the hometown game (be it football or late-season baseball), nor a pickup truck in which to celebrate it, so I do my tailgating in the comfort of my own living room. This means that while I enjoy a pre-kickoff meal of grilled bratwurst or burgers as much as the next fan, I can also make a long-cooking beef stew.

I know, stew again. Yes, I just posted a stew recipe, and it was kind of ugly. Well, this one went a little better. This time the crust that formed on the bottom of the pot earned the label of fond as revered by French chefs (or “black stuff,” as it is affectionately known by Harry and his brothers). It was the dark and rich foundation of a tangy beef stew.

Not only did I want to prove that I could make a stew without burning it, but I wanted to post this before the weekend arrived, in case you needed some inspiration for your own tailgate party, whether it takes place in your home or in a stadium parking lot. I made this Beef Stew with Tomatillos and Poblano Chiles to celebrate the kickoff of the NFL season on Thursday night.

I was not only inspired by the beginning of the autumn sporting season, however, but by a lovely bunch of tomatillos in our CSA box. Tomatillos are kind of like a green tomato, although they’re actually related to gooseberries. Since I know next to nothing about gooseberries, however, I tend to treat them more like tomatoes. They taste and smell like a cross between under-ripe tomatoes and Granny Smith apples, and they’re great as a base of salsas or in chili and stew.

Tomatillos need to have their papery husks removed and a sticky coating scrubbed off of their skin before they’re ready for the stew pot. In this recipe, they are then chopped up and added to the stew to cook away and form a tangy base for the beef, potatoes and peppers. The poblano peppers in this stew are significantly spicier than, say, a bell pepper, which they resemble, though they are darker green in color. They do not come close to the intensity of the smaller chiles, however, such as jalapenos or serranos. I grilled them and peeled them using the method I would use for a red bell pepper, as I did in this post. (Since my hands tend to burn hours later when handling even mild chiles, I used rubber gloves to handle the poblanos.) The resulting tender flesh sort of melts into the stew, giving it a slow burn of chile spice.

This stew does take a long time to make, but most of that time is hands-off. It might even be a good candidate for a make-ahead slow-cooker meal. I used some of my waiting time to make cornbread and pico de gallo as well as to get acquainted with my new blender and whip up a couple of margaritas to accompany the stew. Now it’s a party, tailgate or no tailgate.

Beef Stew with Tomatillos and Roasted Poblano Chiles
Adapted from a recipe in Cooking Light magazine.

2 poblano chiles
1 pound tomatillos
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons coarse salt, divided, plus more to taste
¼ teaspoon black pepper
1 pound beef stew meat, cut into about 1-inch pieces
4 tablespoons canola or vegetable oil, divided
1 large onion, chopped
1 large green bell pepper, chopped
4-6 cloves garlic (depending on their size), minced
1 (12-ounce) bottle dark beer (such as Negra Modelo)
2 cups beef broth (I used reduced sodium)
1 tablespoon chopped fresh oregano
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander seed
2 pounds potatoes, peeled and chopped into about 1-inch cubes

1. Preheat a broiler or grill. If using the broiler, place the whole poblano chiles on a foil-lined baking sheet. Broil or grill, turning the peppers as each section gets charred until the skin of the peppers is blackened and blistered all over.

2. Place the peppers in a bowl and cover the bowl tightly with plastic wrap. The peppers will steam themselves, allowing the skin to be removed. Let stand for 20 minutes or until the peppers are cool enough to handle easily. Remove the peppers from the bowl and peel off the blackened skins. Use rubber gloves if your hands are sensitive to chile peppers. Remove the stem, seeds, and membranes from the peppers. Chop and set aside. You can do this up to a few days ahead and store the roasted peppers in the refrigerator until ready to use.

3. Remove the papery husks from the tomatillos. Wash them well and scrub off any sticky residue on their skin. Chop and set aside.

4. Mix together the flour, 1 teaspoon salt and black pepper on a large plate or a shallow bowl. Dredge the stew meat in the flour mixture to coat.

5. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in a Dutch oven or large pot over medium heat. Add the stew meat in a single layer and brown on all sides. Remove the browned meat from the pan and set aside. You will need to do this in at least two batches. Add an additional tablespoon of oil as needed.

6. When all of the meat has been browned, add the remaining 1 tablespoon oil to the pan. Add the onion and green bell pepper and ½ teaspoon salt. Cook, stirring frequently for 5 minutes. The onions will begin to appear translucent.

7. Stir in the garlic. Add the beer and scrape up the browned bits from the bottom of the pan. Add the beef broth, oregano, cumin and coriander. Stir in the beef, tomatillos and roasted poblanos. Bring to a boil. Cover and reduce the heat. Boil gently for 1 hour.

8. Uncover the pan and add the potatoes and remaining teaspoon salt. Boil gently, uncovered for about 1 hour and 30 minutes more, or until the potatoes and beef are tender. Taste them to determine if they are done. Also taste for salt and add more if desired.

Makes about 6 servings.

Other recipes like this one: Chorizo and Chipotle Chili, Beef and Guinness Pot Pie

One year ago: Bean Dip with Sour Cream, Salsa and Cheese

Kiss Me I'm (Really Not Very) Irish

Chances are that if you’re not Irish, you pretend to be for St. Patrick’s Day. You’ll wear a little green, stick some shamrock and leprechaun decorations in your window and maybe knock back a few Guinness Extra Stouts or green-dyed lagers. And you’ll even think about what to have for dinner. Corned beef and cabbage get the promotional spaces at the supermarket, but you might (especially if you really are Irish) have a colcannon, soda bread, or Irish stew recipe that has been passed down to you through the generations.

My few drops of Irish blood didn’t come with a recipe box, and I can’t remember if I’ve ever even eaten corned beef that wasn’t in deli-sliced form. (I do have vague memories of searching for corned beef in South Texas supermarkets, so maybe I did cook it one year.) Luckily, I also don’t have any ethnic food police after me (that I know of) so I can take a bit of a side-step and celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with a Beef and Guinness Pot Pie. This is one of Harry’s absolute favorite dishes, and I’ve been trying to follow Aunt Helen’s advice and make it more often, but he always gets it at least once a year.


This is a rich and delicious beef stew with a fluffy and crispy puff pastry cover. It’s loaded with slowly cooked beef enhanced with dark, rich, slightly bitter (but not unpleasantly so) character from a bottle of Guinness. It also gets a peppery kick from brined green peppercorns. These are simply younger peppercorns that still have some of their fruit qualities, which have been bottled in brine rather than dried. They are milder in spice than the more familiar black peppercorns. They also contribute a touch of briny flavor and a little something vegetal that dried peppercorns don’t bring along. They sort of dissolve into the stew and take on the persona of a secret ingredient (I won’t tell if you don’t.) I love them, plain and simple.

You can find brined green peppercorns in larger supermarkets, usually shelved with things like pickles, olives and capers. In fact, they kind of look like capers and are packed in little jars of similar style, so they’re a bit difficult to spot on the shelf. I think it’s worth making the effort, however, since they give this dish a unique quality that isn’t too weird or palate-shocking.

I usually place the fully-cooked beef stew (which you could make ahead of time) in single-serving crocks, cover them with thawed store-bought puff pastry, and bake them until the pastry is puffed and browned. You could also bake the squares of puff pastry separately and float them onto bowls of the stew. (This is what I usually do with leftovers.) Or, you could forgo the puff pastry altogether and use a different pastry crust, or simply serve this as a stew with biscuits or bread.

Whether it’s with corned beef and cabbage, Beef and Guinness Pot Pie, or your usual Wednesday night fare with a dash of green food coloring I hope you celebrate St. Paddy well (and responsibly) even if your Irish roots are a little weak. I would suggest, however, that you’re careful who you kiss, Irish or not, especially after a few of those green beers.

Beef and Guinness Potpie
Modified from Gourmet magazine

This recipe can take 3 hours or more to prepare, so make sure to allow yourself enough time.

2 lb boneless beef chuck
2 Tbs all-purpose flour
1 tsp salt
½ tsp black pepper
2 Tbs canola or vegetable oil, divided
1 large onion, coarsely chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1 ½ Tbs tomato paste
1 ½ cups beef broth
1 (11.2 ounce) bottle Guinness or other Irish stout
1 Tbs Worcestershire sauce
2 tsp drained brined green peppercorns, coarsely chopped
2 fresh thyme sprigs or ½ teaspoon dried thyme
1 pound peeled potatoes, cut into 1-inch cubes
½ (17.3 ounce) package puff pastry (1 sheet) (or more if needed), thawed

1. Pat the beef dry with paper towels if it is damp on the surface. Cut the beef into 1-2 inch cubes. Combine the flour, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Add the cubed beef and toss to coat with the flour mixture.

2. Heat 1 tablespoon oil in a large pot, such as a Dutch oven, over medium heat. Add the beef in one layer and cook, turning to brown on all sides. Remove the browned beef from the pot and place in a clean bowl or on a clean plate. Repeat with the remaining beef, adding more of the oil as needed.

3. When all the beef has been browned, add the onion to the pan. Cook over medium heat 3 minutes. Add garlic and ½ cup beef broth. Scrape up any browned bits from the bottom of the pot.

4. Stir in the tomato paste and cook 1 minute. Add the beef and any juices that may have accumulated in the bowl. Add the remaining 1 cup broth, Guinness, Worcestershire sauce, brined green peppercorns and thyme.

5. Bring to a simmer. Cover and simmer 1 hour. Add the potatoes. Simmer about 1 hour more or until the beef is very tender. Remove the lid for the last 30 minutes to thicken the stew if desired. Remove the stems from the thyme sprigs if you used fresh thyme. The stew can be made ahead of time up to this point.


6. Preheat the oven to 450 F. Spoon stew into 4 oven-proof single-serving crocks or soup bowls. Cut the puff pastry sheet into 4 squares. (You can cut it smaller or larger, or use more than one sheet, depending on the size of the bowls you are using.) Place 1 sheet of puff pastry on top of each filled bowl. Gently press to adhere to the sides of the bowl. Cut 2 to 3 slits in the top of the pastry to allow steam to escape as it bakes.

7. Place the pot pies on a baking sheet for easy transfer to the oven. Bake at 450 F 10-15 minutes or until the puff pastry is well browned. Remove from the oven and let stand 5-10 minutes. The stew under the pastry will be very hot.

Makes about 4 servings.

Good Advice and Spaghetti Pie

At my bridal shower (over ten years ago), the hostess passed around a journal and the ladies all wrote down some advice for my plunge into married life. It was all very good advice, like that from my Aunt Vivian’s mother Cathy: “Let Harry make all of the big decisions and you can make all of the small ones…of course there won’t be any of those big decisions.” Then there’s the bit from my Grandma Lorraine that I wish I had the ability to follow a little more carefully: “Bite your tongue occasionally (quite a bit). Mine is full of holes.”

But the easiest piece of advice to follow was from my mother’s aunt Helen: “Once in a while cook his favorite meal as a surprise.” Maybe I don’t get the surprise part down so well, because I can’t stop talking about what I’m going to cook next. Last time I made Spaghetti Pie, however, I managed to keep it under my hat until a whole day before I made it. Harry was appropriately surprised. And very happy.

Not only is this one of Harry’s favorite meals, but it also has a high nostalgia quotient because it was one of the first recipes I tried when I decided I wanted to teach myself to cook. I think I’ve been making it for nearly ten years now. The problem is, with so many new recipes to try (I’ve posted over 90 in these pages already, and those are just some of the good ones) I don’t make Spaghetti Pie nearly often enough. Another problem was that the original recipe just made too much and I would get tired of the leftovers and wouldn’t want to make it again any time soon. The simple solution was to scale down the recipe. I won’t tell you how many years it took me to figure that out.

This casserole is a layer of spaghetti noodles topped with a mixture of sour cream, softened cream cheese, and green onions. This, in turn, is topped with a beefy tomato sauce, then a layer of gooey melted cheese. I’m sure you could use ground turkey in place of the beef in the sauce, and, while I like the flavor of cheddar cheese on top, you could probably use something else that melts well, such as Monterey Jack, or mozzarella.

Since this is a food blog I won’t be giving any marital advice, but I will say that if you’re just learning to cook and these flavors look good to you, this is a solid recipe to try. If you’re a seasoned veteran, it’s quite easy and won’t take much of your time. If you’re feeding a larger crew this recipe can be doubled, and the leftovers heat nicely in the microwave.

I may not know the universal secrets to wedded bliss, but Harry doesn’t seem to have become tired of me yet. Thanks to all the good advice, and the Spaghetti Pie (even the leftovers), I must be doing something right.

Spaghetti Pie
Adapted from Cooking Light Magazine.

4 ounces uncooked spaghetti noodles
8 ounces ground beef (I used ground chuck)
½ tsp salt, divided
¼ tsp black pepper, divided
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 (8-oz) can tomato sauce
¾ cups sour cream
¼ cup chopped green onions
¼ cup (2 oz) cream cheese, softened
1 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese

1. Cook the spaghetti in boiling salted water until it is slightly underdone. You want it to be a little more firm than you would eat it on its own. It will cook a little more in the oven later. Drain the noodles and place them into a 1-quart casserole or baking dish.

2. Cook the beef in a medium-size skillet over medium heat until browned. Stir often to crumble. Stir in the ¼ teaspoon salt, 1/8 teaspoon pepper and garlic and cook 1 minute more.

3. Stir in the tomato sauce. Bring the mixture to a boil, reduce the heat and simmer for 15-20 minutes or until the mixture has thickened.

4. Preheat the oven to 350 F. In a small bowl, combine the sour cream, green onions, cream cheese, ¼ teaspoon salt and 1/8 teaspoon pepper. Spread the mixture over the spaghetti in the casserole dish. Pour the meat sauce over the top. Cover with the cheddar cheese.

5. Cover the dish and bake at 350 F for 15 minutes. Uncover and bake another 10 minutes, or until the cheese is bubbly. Remove from the oven and cool at least 5 minutes before serving.

Makes 3-4 servings.

September Tomatoes

I always have an orderly rank of recipes lined up, eagerly waiting to volunteer their services to the tomatoes that come in July and August. I can hardly wait to make Gazpacho. I always hope the basil in the containers on my porch will be ready when the first cherry tomatoes are in the CSA box so I can make Pasta with Cherry Tomatoes, Olives and Basil. Sandwiches and salads benefit from that sweet-tart and juicy boost that can only come from ripe seasonal tomatoes. When it gets to September, however, I want something different. Even if it hasn’t started to get cold yet (for the record, it just did), the days are noticeably shorter, the breezes a little cooler, and warmer food somehow beckons more forcefully than cold soups.



When I got a gift of beautiful heirloom tomatoes from my friends Jen and Jake (I do believe Jen is the gardener) a little while back, I wanted to do something particularly nice with them. I knew I was probably going to make a sauce or salsa or something out of many of them, just because it would be hard for even me, a great lover of tomatoes, to just eat them all fresh, much as I wanted to.

After I’d been shopping for the week, I remembered this great recipe for a tomato and beef stir fry I had copied from a cookbook by Martin Yan way back when. In fact, the when was so way back that I had never made this dish for Harry, at least not that either of us could remember, and I’ve known him for 12 years. Luckily, I had just bought some steak for Harry, so I happened to have what I needed for the recipe. It was a New York strip steak, which is pretty fancy for stir fry. Normally, I would use flank steak, sirloin, or even round steak for stir frying, cutting it across the grain to ensure more tenderness in the final product (the shorter fibers result in easier, more pleasant chewing). I have to say, the strip steak was super tender in this dish, and since the recipe doesn’t use much beef, a more expensive cut is still reasonably economical. Use what you like or what you have.

I made a few other changes to the original recipe that also reflected what I happened to have in my pantry at the time, plus I increased the amount of tomatoes. For me, it was all about the tomatoes. The final dish had the consistency of a stew, and, if you didn’t feel like messing with rice or noodles, or if your cupboard was bare of such starches, you could serve this like a stew. I served it over brown rice, which soaked up the savory sauce. The complex flavors of the perfect heirloom tomatoes worked and played extremely well with the soy sauce and vinegar. Harry said the flavors oscillated on the tongue. I needn’t say more than that.

Tomato and Beef Stir Fry
Based on a recipe by Martin Yan

2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons Shaoxing wine or dry sherry
2 tsp cornstarch
¾ lb beef steak, such as flank steak, sirloin, round steak (or whatever you like), thinly sliced across the grain
¼ cup ketchup
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1 tablespoon chile garlic sauce
1 teaspoon sesame oil
2 teaspoons sugar
2 tablespoons vegetable or peanut oil, divided
1 tablespoon minced garlic
1 small onion, chopped (about 1-inch pieces)
1 cup green bell pepper, chopped (about 1-inch pieces)
4 cups tomato cut into wedges (about 3 large tomatoes
2 teaspoons cornstarch
2 tablespoons water

1. Combine 2 tablespoons soy sauce, dry sherry and 2 tsp cornstarch in a medium bowl. Add the sliced steak and stir to coat evenly. Set aside about 30 minutes (you can prepare the rest of the ingredients and any accompaniments during this time).

2. Combine the ketchup, 2 tablespoons soy sauce, rice vinegar, chile garlic sauce, sesame oil and sugar in a medium bowl to make a sauce. Set aside.

3. Heat a wok or large skillet with 1 tablespoon vegetable or peanut oil over high heat. Remove the beef from the marinade with a slotted spoon and add it to the hot oil. Stir fry about 2 minutes or until beef is evenly browned. Remove beef from the pan and set aside in a clean bowl or plate.

4. Add remaining 1 tablespoon vegetable or peanut oil to the pan. Add the onion and bell pepper. Stir fry about 2 minutes or until the vegetables soften somewhat and the onion begins to brown. Add the garlic and cook 30 seconds.

5. Add the tomatoes and the sauce and mix well. Cook about 1 minute.

6. Combine 2 teaspoons cornstarch and 2 tablespoons water and mix well. Add to the wok along with the cooked beef. Cook and stir until the sauce boils and thickens.

Serve over hot rice or noodles, or perhaps even in a bowl like a stew.
Makes 4 servings.