Presentation Possibilities: Flat Iron Steak with Tarragon-Garlic Sauce

Presentation of food is very important.  Whether you’re serving 20 people or 2, the way the food looks has a huge impact on how we perceive it to taste.  All of our senses are connected and sight, along with smell, affect the way our taste buds react to a dish.  This isn’t to say that there are things that “taste a lot better than they look”… but trust me, presentation helps!

I got a Flat Iron Steak from our local butcher shop, Westphalia Market, and found the perfect recipe to try from Cooking Light.  The recipe called for sirloin but the flat iron worked perfectly.  The recipe serves 4 people so it is great for having guests, or in our case we used the leftovers to make some lovely beef sandwiches.  As you can see from the image below, I presented the beef, sauce, and potatoes all on one medium size serving plate.  I picked a couple sprigs of parsley from our garden to add a bit of color to the plate.  The fanning effect done to the beef adds a nice display and doesn’t use up any more space on the plate than if you just stacked it.  I also made a Broccoli and Parmesan Casserole to accompany the beef and potatoes.

Flat Iron Steak with Tarragon-Garlic Sauce (modified from Cooking Light Magazine)

• 1/4 cup sour cream
• 1/4 mayonnaise
• 2 Tbs whole-grain Dijon mustard
• 1 tsp dried tarragon
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• Kosher salt, to taste
• Cracked black pepper, to taste
• Cooking spray
• 1 lb boneless flat iron steak, trimmed
• 20 ounces small red potatoes, cut into wedges

Combine first 5 ingredients in a small bowl.  Stir in salt and pepper to taste and whisk until smooth.  Set aside.

Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat.  Coat with cooking spray.  Sprinkle both sides of steak with kosher salt and cracked pepper and add steak to pan.  Cook covered for 5-7 minutes on each side, or until desired degree of doneness.  Remove from pan; let stand for 5 minutes**.  Cut into 1/4 inch thick slices.  Keep warm.

** Letting the meat stand for 5 minutes is really important for keeping the juices in the meat.  If you cut it immediately, the juices will escape and you’ll be left with dry flat iron steak.

Wipe pan with a paper towel, return to heat.  Re-coat pan with cooking spray.  Add the potatoes; saute 15 minutes or until browned and thoroughly heated, stirring occasionally.

Serve with steak and sauce.

Recipe Take Away: 

We really enjoyed this recipe and the sauce was wonderful.  However, we have really found that we prefer our beef grilled.  Cooking the flat iron steak in the pan prior to the potatoes didn’t add a huge amount of flavor to the spuds.  So next time we are going to grill the meat separately and then just either fry or roast the red potatoes.