Cooking: Steak with Raspberry Red Wine Sauce · Society of Ordinary Gentlemen

Cooking: Steak with Raspberry Red Wine Sauce

Indeed, it's time for a new culinary delight.

I was curious after coming across a few videos to make a raspberry red wine steak sauce, and figured V-Day was as fitting a day as ever for it.

INGREDIENTS

2 cups fresh Raspberries
2/3 cup red wine (divided)
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 tbsp lemon luice
1/4 tsp thyme
1/4 tsp pepper
2 minced cloves & 2 crushed cloves garlic
2 beef tenderloin steaks
1 tsp olive oil
Salt to taste
1-2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp white sugar (optional)
Chipotle Powder to taste (optional)

INSTRUCTIONS

Whisk together vegetable oil, 1/3 cup of red wine, lemon juice, thyme, and minced garlic.
Place the steaks in a shallow dish/bowl and pour the marinade over them.
Cover and let marinate for at least 2 hours (up to 6 hours).
Preheat a skillet over medium-high heat.
Remove the steaks from the marinade and season with salt and pepper.
Add butter to the skillet, then cook the steaks for about 2 minutes on each side.
Check middle of meat temp; should be between 110-120F for medium rare.
Remove the steaks and set aside.
Prepare the Sauce in the same skillet; add olive oil and sauté the crushed garlic for about 30 seconds.
Add raspberries and the remaining 1/3 cup of red wine.
Cook for about 4-5 minutes, stirring until the sauce thickens.
Optionally, stir in sugar and chipotle powder (or smoked paprika) to taste.
Serve the steaks and drizzle the raspberry red wine sauce over them (and side, such as mashed potatoes or noodles).

RESULT

For the most part, came out very well.

Steaks were quite tender and juicy from the marinade. The wine I used had a unique effect; Stella Rosa blueberry. It's a relatively inexpensive sparkling wine (sparkling as in carbonated, not non-alcoholic so as to not be misleading... but the alcohol cooks off in the process). This extra berry flavor added to the depth and complexity of the raspberry sauce, and added a slightly gamey taste to the steaks... like venison on a strict berry diet.

The sauce was quite a journey; from watching the raspberries break down, to taste-testing the sugar, and balancing the overall sweet, tart, and slightly spicy addition of smoked chipotle pepper seasoning I used, with depth from the smoked paprika seasoning. If you prefer something less spicy, highly recommend just the smoked paprika.

Minced vs crushed garlic: Though you end up mincing them both, crushing the garlic releases an enzyme called alliinase, which catalyzes the formation of allicin, the compound responsible for garlic's distinctive aroma and flavor. Highly recommend doing it with mashed potatoes. Be warned, though - Allicin is unstable and quickly breaks down into other sulfur-containing compounds. That certainly explains a girl with a similar name long ago in my high school geometry class that I used to sit behind...

EXPERIMENTS

Once I ran out of sides and didn't have much steak left, and needed to use up the remaining pizza dough, I chopped the steak into nickel-sized portions for topping, and mixed the remainder of the sauce with the custom tomato sauce I make. It added a really nice extra kick to the overall pizza flavor, and complimented the more herbal taste I added to the dough (along with the mesquite honey I add to the perimeter, then fold over the edges to make a honey-filled crust).

EDIT

As noted in my exchange with David, a fascinating fact about raspberry and steak: Astronauts say when they smell their space suits, despite being in a vacuum, space indeed has a smell; akin to raspberry, rum, or grilled steak. Something about similar chemical composition.

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