Well July is here, and it got here really quickly. Having said that I have been looking forward to July for quite some time. This is the time of year that I normally get down to Margret River and get the chance to pick up some nice wines and plenty of fresh marron. There are a few more things on my list to get this time around though, for one I’m hoping to get to Harvey for some fresh beef (either a tenderloin, a rib roast rack or both) and hit the venison farm. But that’s still a little way off and I’ll write more about that once it’s happened. For now let’s talk about how I started off July. First thing to kick the month off was my attempt at a flourless chocolate cake. I’ll say first of it tasted ok, I used quite a dark chocolate and probably not enough sugar so it was a little bitter but still quite nice. The main reason I don’t want to mention much of this effort is because, well, it was a cock-up. A big one. One of the things I should have realised about these cakes is that the eggs are a raising agent, and so if you beat air into the eggs when dissolving the sugar, its going to rise. A lot. And that’s what happened, I put the batter into small round moulds filled to the top (also a bad move) and almost as soon as they got into a preheated oven they started to rise and overflow so by the time I got them out of the oven they looked like little chocolate volcanoes. A lesson learnt on this one, but I’m now determined to go back and get it right, because it was quite rich and decadent with all those eggs and chocolate in there so it would be an ideal end to a meal if executed well.

Last night I decided to actually do something that I’ve wanted to try for ages, steak tartare. Now as I’ve already mentioned I’m loving Masterchef Australia at the moment and can’t get enough of what they do on the show. That was really what led me to do the steak tartar last night, I just saw the recipe on the page as I was flicking through and it seemed so simple and I had pretty much everything I needed here already. The only thing missing was a nice piece of steak so off to the shops I went to get a nice rib eye. Unfortunately there was no rib eye to be seen but a nice thick cut sirloin would do the job nicely. The thing about a dish like this is that it’s all about the meat, so it needs to be a good cut. No one wants to eat a raw piece of topside so I wouldn’t even consider doing this without a good quality cut of meat, one that’s nice and tender and beautifully marbled. While I was out I managed to spy some nice looking squid tubes and thought that might be a good way to get a bit of warmth into the night since I was going to be having a cold main, so I grabbed a couple of tubes, a fennel bulb and some red chilli before heading home for dinner.

When I got home the first thing to do was get the fennel ready and into the oven to sweat for a little while as this was really the only cooking that needed doing (along with a quick 30 seconds or so for the squid). An alfoil pouch was folded and ready to take half the fennel bulb sliced along with half a sliced chilli, the zest ad juice of half a lemon and a knob of butter. That went into a moderately hot oven for about 45 minutes to sweat and the only thing left to do for this was clean the squid tubes and cut them into reasonable sized bits ready for the frying pan. Once that was sorted I moved onto the main course which was basically just an exercise in chopping. After getting the beef diced into to smallish cubes half a shallot was diced to the same size as were 4 cornichons and the three components combined well in a bowl before adding a good splash of Worcestershire sauce and a dollop of french mustard. Mix everything together well and let it sit in the fridge till you are ready to plate up though I don’t know how long it would keep. Everything was done and the fennel was nicely translucent so I got a pan very very hot before adding a little olive oil and then the squid, it reacted to the heat very quickly so moving fast here is essential, have everything ready to go in. Once the squid was in first thing was some salt and pepper, followed by some freshly diced chilli, then fennel seeds and finally a bit of butter then the contents of the pouch were dumped in and the whole lot tossed together in the pan. a few seconds together in the pan and then the whole lot was removed and taken straight to the plate for the first course. I really enjoyed this dish, it was fresh and full of flavour from the sweated down fennel and had just enough of a chilli hint to warm me up on a particularly cold winter night. The squid was beautifully tender having received barely any heat and a quick squeeze of lemon over the top really topped the whole thing off. I think if I were to do it again a few bits of fresh coriander over the top would really enhance the dish and its presentation.

Satisfied with the squid I was wondering if I even needed to worry about the steak next but knowing I was going out that night I decided to get the fuel tank up to full and then head out. I plated up the steak first in a circular mound and made a little well in the centre to house an egg yolk. Next I got another frying pan nice and hot then buttered a couple of bits of bread that I cut from an Italian loaf and pan fried them for a few minutes until they were nice and golden. I tried some of the tartare by itself first and it was really nice. The meat was good and juicy and the cornichons gave a nice sweetness to the dish with a good mustard flavour lingering on the palate once the mouth was empty. It’s the kind of thing that you don’t really notice is raw straight away which I liked. What came next was pure heaven though, a bit of the egg yolk with the steak onto a piece of the toasted bread. My god, it was amazing, the yolk made such a huge difference and the contrast of the soft slippery meat with the crunchy buttery bread was fantastic. I can’t say enough how much I enjoyed this dish, it was fantastic. But as I seem to be saying a lot lately, it’s really through any marvel of my own cooking ability, it’s simply classic flavours that someone else worked out taste good together and using really good quality ingredients. The beef was the star here, and being the star you need to make sure it comes out as special, using the topside steak that’s on special won’t perform anywhere near as well. All in all, very happy with the meal and given a bit more time a nice apple tarte tatin to finish would have been great but as it was I had to get going and walked out the door nicely full ready for a night out. So that’s it for now, I’ll be back soon with tales from Margret River.

-Kevin