Blue-Cheese-Crusted Steaks with Red Wine Sauce

This broke many of my eating rules: It is meaty, heavy, requires more than one pan to prepare and the kitchen wound up messy. It is not a dish that I will make again but I believe it has the potential to be much tastier than I made it. Maybe even four-star potential in another kitchen. Let me tell what I did wrong: Mistake #1: This recipe originally calls for filet mignon. I didn’t want to spend much money so I bought a couple of flat iron steaks from Trader Joes. Mistake #2: I bought the steak from Trader Joes, right as an employee was loading up a shopping cart with old meat that they were going to throw out. You’d think that would trigger a caution signal in my head – it turns out my cheapy flat iron steaks did taste cheap and old. Mistake #3 I thought I had planko in the cupboard but, no, it was just plain ol bread crumbs with Italian seasoning – that seasoning threw the dish way off. Thank God for the red wine sauce. I love, love, love the red wine sauce in this dish – I would of put it on everything on the plate except I did a little too much reducing and ended up with a mere ½ cup. Surprisingly this turned out to be a pretty good meal after all of the goofs – a little strange tasting with the Italian bread crumbs but satisfying in a rich, hardy meal type of way. I really believe this would be an excellent dish for someone who likes steak if done right – It was also a rather unphotogenic dish but I will post the photos soon.

Here is the recipe from Bon Appétit November 2003

Blue-cheese-crusted steaks with red wine sauce

4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) chilled butter
3 garlic cloves, chopped
1 large shallot, chopped
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
3/4 cup low-salt beef broth
1/2 cup dry red wine

1/2 cup coarsely crumbled Maytag blue cheese (about 2 ounces)
1/4 cup panko (Japanese breadcrumbs)*
1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley

4 1-inch-thick filet mignon steaks (each 6 to 8 ounces)
Melt 1 tablespoon butter in heavy medium skillet over medium-high heat. Add garlic, shallot, and thyme. Sauté until shallot is tender, about 5 minutes. Add broth and wine. Boil until sauce is reduced to 1/2 cup, about 12 minutes. Set sauce aside.

Blend cheese, panko, and parsley in small bowl to coat cheese evenly with panko. (Sauce and cheese mixture can be made 1 day ahead. Cover separately and chill.)

Preheat broiler. Melt 2 tablespoons butter in heavy large skillet over medium-high heat. Sprinkle steaks with salt and pepper. Add steaks to skillet and cook to desired doneness, about 5 minutes per side for medium-rare. Transfer steaks to rimmed baking sheet; reserve skillet. Press cheese mixture onto top of steaks, dividing equally. Broil until cheese browns, about 2 minutes. Transfer steaks to plates.

Pour sauce into reserved skillet. Bring to boil, scraping up browned bits. Boil 2 minutes. Whisk in remaining 1 tablespoon butter. Season with salt and pepper. Spoon sauce around steaks and serve.

*Available at Asian markets and in the Asian section of some supermarkets.
Makes 4 servings.