This was simple, came out perfectly, and is a definite do over. With a thyme au jus, mashed potatoes, sprouts, and yorkshire pudding, it was an excellent Christmas dinner. This is a Bobby Flay recipe. The leftovers were awesome, too!
Beef
Hoisin Grilled Flank Steak
This was an easy and tasty modified Cooking Light recipe – modified because I marinated it for 8 hours, rather than putting sauce on it and cooking it. Being a flank steak, I was skeptical of how tough it would be if it had no marinade at all. This came out well, especially because Shawn grilled it – thank goodness we’re getting back to grilling weather! 🙂 We had this with spiral zucchini, carrots, and radishes as a “noodle” side, tossed with some soy sauce and black vinegar.
Meat Pies
It seems like only yesterday that we went to London and Brussels, but it has been three years! Time really flies. To celebrate, we had a weekend of food we enjoyed there, from pubs around here with lovely Belgian and English beers on tap, to mussels and frites, baked beans (Shawn loves a full English breakfast 🙂 ), and finally meat pies. I won’t lie, I actually got the idea to make them to go with Shawn’s awesome beans when I picked up our Harry Potter cookbook and saw, “Molly Weasley’s meat pies.” How could I resist that? Coupled with the fact that Shawn had been wanting to make them for a while made it a no-brainer to give them a shot. We made two hand pies, a traditional beef and onion British pie, and a Tourtiere, which is a French-Canadian pork meat pie. We preferred the beef, but the pork was good too and with some adjustment (more gravy – it was a bit dry) would be excellent. These were a lot of fun, and if you make hand pies, you will have plenty to freeze for later!
Roasted Herbed Beef Tenderloin
We decided on roast beef tenderloin for Christmas dinner this year, and we were VERY happy with the results. I didn’t do much to it – it stood out on its own for sure. A little compound butter and in it went for what I would say was by far the best Christmas dinner I have ever done. We’re swimming in leftovers, but I’m not complaining. This method came from Chow.
Tibetan Beef and Sichuan Peppercorn Dumplings
My favorite cookbook is definitely, “Asian Dumplings,” by Andrea Nguyen. I’ve yet to make anything I didn’t like, and some of them I really love. They are great to share with friends! We had a great time with our friends for a dumplings, ramen, and games night, and this was one of the meat dumplings I made. I really enjoyed it…different than the pork dumplings I’m used to, and very interesting! These are called Sha Momo, and I highly recommend you check them out, as well as the entire book! Forgive the photo – it was post-steaming and it was…well, steamy. 😉
Slow Cooker Shredded Beef Taco Bowls
While this recipe was underwhelming, it really has potential if seasoned correctly. In retrospect, I really should have thought out how much seasoning I was using for a slow cooker recipe. It was pretty good once it was mixed with all the taco toppings, but it would have been excellent if it had more seasoning. I doubled the spices in the recipe below, which originally came from Gimme Some Oven. Or, you could use a homemade taco seasoning mix – that’s what I will do next time. I think a large flank steak might do well, too. I used a chuck roast and wouldn’t again.
Slow Cooker Ropa Vieja
Wow, we loved this! I got this recipe from the really fun “My Big Fat Cuban Family” website. I’ve had her recipes bookmarked to try forever and finally got around to this one – we’ll be doing more of Marta’s recipes soon. This was easy and honestly, we actually liked it better sans rice (good for me and low-carbin’ it). My only mistake was over-salting and it was still great.
Mustard-Peppercorn Rib Roast
We decided on a standing rib roast for Christmas dinner this year, and I don’t have much experience with them – but this was a winner. Nice cut, easy to do, and found a rub recipe that we really loved! This came from Chow and we were thrilled with it – only change is that I only put the rub on the outside – didn’t cut into the roast. We served this with garlic blue cheese mashed potatoes and green beans…I think this goes down as my favorite holiday dinner I have ever done.
Picadillo
I really enjoy Cuban food, but this was not something I have tried before. When I saw it on Skinnytaste, I thought perhaps it was worth a try, as it was pretty healthy when made with very lean ground beef (in this case I used 96%, but 93% would fine). I checked out some other recipes and will modify a few things next time because we like a lot of flavor, but this was quite good! Definitely a keeper recipe, and the great thing is that it can be made in the slow cooker! Directions for both below. We served this over brown rice with steamed broccoli on the side.
Miso-Marinated Steak
This was an unusual enough marinade that it caught my eye. I had only yellow miso on hand, but it turned out really well – we loved it. I only marinated for 45 minutes or so and it was fine…I imagine it’d be awesome for a few hours. Roasting it made the flank steak nice and tender. Served this with some bok choy sauteed in a little soy sauce and Sriracha.
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Om nom nom! 