…with a rich and creamy whisky/cognac sauce, yum!
It took me awhile to figure out how to pan sear a perfect steak without setting off allllll of the smoke alarms in my house.
Pro tip: make sure that steak is dried all the way out before putting it on a cast iron skillet. Take the steak out of the fridge at least an hour before you want to cook it. Dry it out on each side with paper towels.
Then heavily salt it on each side. I like chunky sea salt or kosher salt. Hold off on adding other seasonings (pepper, fresh rosemary and garlic) until the steak is almost done.
Heat the pan on medium high for about ten minutes before the steak hits the pan. It may smoke, open up some windows just in case.
Flip steak every minute to 90 seconds or so until desired temperature (about 5 minutes for medium rare; longer if you want it cooked more thoroughly). May need to re-salt the pan a bit, and add a small bit of oil if you want a little sizzle.
During the last two minutes of the heating process, add in all the fun stuff: butter, 3-4 garlic cloves, fresh rosemary and pepper. Make sure the butter and fixins slide around the meat, flipping a few times so it’s seasoned on each side.
Once the steak is cooked to your liking, remove it from the pan and keep the seasonings in the pan for the base of your sauce. Reduce the heat to a very low setting. Add 1/3 cup of your brown liquor of choice (my husband is a whiskey drinker so I used what we have – Basil Hayden’s). Mix in 1 cup of heavy cream, and stir and stir and stir until it gets thicker. Add more cream if you want a thicker sauce. The sauce will have some of the garlic and rosemary remnants so you can strain or spoon it, if desired. The sauce is soooooo good, but if you put on a lot, you may feel a slight buzz – just a warning. The next time I make this, I’ll make double the sauce, it went fast.
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