I made some steak tartare last night, after not doing so for months cos i was SO FREAKING BUSY Sept-Dec. Now i’m a bit more free so i’ve been taking the time to cook heaps, visit the bank so many times to the point i know the people’s names by heart, finally change my braces at MyDentist, and returning to Powerplate classes.

Steak tartare.
Some people are totally icked out by eating raw meat.
Well, i don’t blame you.
But the trick is to get really GOOD and FRESH meat.
Once you’ve got that sorted, the rest is easy and eating steak tartare will be like having good sex.
The more you practice it the better the sex is.

It filled this little void in my taste buds with so much satisfaction and delight, i was doing a little dance and hops of joy in the kitchen by myself with no music.

See, steak tartare gets you dancing to the music in your HEAD. HOW CAN YOU NOT WANT THIS?!

Someone tweeted me where they can order a good one in town, but i said there is none i would recommend… so i thought i’d give a recipe to spread the love of steak tartare cos it’s just SO GOOD AND ARGHHH. Making it for yourself is also a lot cheaper and you can edit the recipe.

Serves 2 (tho i’d eat this portion ALL by myself, i remember Kevin telling me Claudia once ate 400g by herself!)

– 200g great-quality beef (i get tenderloin medallions from the gourmet butcher on BSC ground floor and would recommend you do the same. It’s RM199/kg. Otherwise sirloin or topside is said to be alright too.)
– 1 shallot
– 1 teaspoon of cornichons
– bit of parsley
– 2 cloves of garlic
– 1 egg yolk (or 2 quail yolks)
– sea salt
– black pepper
– 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil (less if you like)

Finely chop the beef into thin strips, and put to one side. It takes awhile but is important!
Finely chop the shallot, cornichons, parsley and garlic. Mix together the olive oil, salt, pepper and the egg yolk. Then mix everything with the meat. Add more salt or pepper if need be.

That’s it.

Some people omit the egg yolk but add capers or a teaspoon of grain mustard, the Italians add grated Parmesan, i added the garlic cos i love garlic, you can add other herbs you prefer. The beauty of steak tartare is that you can make it however you desire and add/omit whatever you want. Some eat it with bread or salad, tho i eat it alone cos i want to.

For presentation’s sake, you can divide the above into two portions into low cylinders, and place the quail egg yolk into a half-broken shell so it sits gracefully in the middle by pressing it down a tad. And have some salad with it so you have a balanced meal, hur hur.

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Since i bought tenderloin to make myself steak tartare (Clem doesn’t eat it) i used the rest to make some medium rare steak and duck fat potatoes.

The meat was so good i don’t know why i bothered making onion red wine sauce. We just had the steak with mustard (i use Maille’s Fine de Dijon).

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Clem bought me a French recipe cookbook for Christmas so i tried Papillote de Poisson aux Legumes. It basically just means baked fish in tin foil packets with lemon, tarragon, butter and white wine.

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I keep smoked salmon and frozen scallops and cod, so that when i feel like cooking on a weekend but don’t feel like driving out i can easily whip up a little something for myself ^.^

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I’ve been buying ox tongue at Village Grocer! There’s this Chef Hisham who sells cooked ox tongue and salted beef at the Sunway Giza’s meat section and i got ever so excited when i saw it. I haven’t had ox tongue in Malaysia EVER. He asked whether i had some before and i said yes, in London. He asked, in Selfridges? And i was like Yesss!! You know it! I’m SO GONNA BUY YOUR OX TONGUE!

This is yet another food that gets two types of reaction from people on Instagram. Either they ask with equal excitement where i got it, or they go all ew on me. Like i always say – don’t knock it till you’ve tried it. The meat is tender and flavourful and its texture is like no other. It’s not easy to prep your own ox tongue or salt beef cos you have to brine it in salt water for two weeks before cooking, so you need lots of fridge space. For now i’m very happy being able to buy it ready-made.

I love slowly nibbling on a piece of ox tongue while reading my book.

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I’ve never had lunch in Brotzeit (Mid Valley) but i’ll go back cos the lunch menu is so worth it! I had the chicken and potatoes above for RM14. Very. Yummy.

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My mum took me to Toast and Roast one day by plying me with the promise of hakka mee. It’s so hard to find hakka mee in KL. Or ones that are close to me anyway. Simple salty minced pork (i always order extra!) on wiry noodles… damn. It reminds me of childhood days when my dad would do takeaways of it whenever he was in Seremban for work.

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As always, i go to Fat Spoon at least once a week to have Spicy Beef Soup with Nissin Noodles (i change the macaroni for nissin and ask for extra soup too). I eat it so much that Chelle bugs me, “Babeeee can’t you order something elseeee?!” (she talks like that)

This is Chelle.

So i tried the Tamarind Prawn Pasta the other day. But nothing there can beat my spicy beef soup. Best hangover food ever. Erm to the point that when i dropped by to have it today, Chelle asked are you hungover? -_- I was NOT.

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Kevin took me to Tray Cafe in Plaza Damas for lunch one day.

I had their special of the day which was roast chicken and veges on mash. Very filling, healthy and tasty. RM18 (i think).

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Yesterday i had lunch with Shaun at Botanical in BV2. I like it cos it’s fairly quiet and serves yummy vegetarian food. I’m not big on vegetarian but after having the buffalo mozzarella & tomato pasta there… i go back just to have it. Shaun had the 4-cheese sandwich which looked like this…

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