Steak and shrimp is one of my favorite meals – simple and classic in a supper-clubby kind of way. There’s very little prep involved and everything cooks fast on a hot grill, so just throw in an obligatory salad or baked potato and you’ve got a really nice dinner cheap and fast.

Spicy Asian Shrimp
I’m working on a base sauce for Kung Pao recipes, and these fiery shrimp are part of that experiment.

1 pound raw large shrimp, pealed and deveined
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon whole Sichuan peppercorns
1 teaspoon chili paste with garlic
1 tablespoon black bean chili sauce
1 tablespoon Hoisin sauce
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons Shaoxing rice wine or dry sherry
4 bamboo skewers

Soak the skewers in water for at least 30 minutes. While the skewers are soaking, combine the salt and peppercorns in a food processor and give them a whirl until the peppercorns break apart and combine with the salt. Add the chili paste, black bean sauce, Hoisin sauce, soy sauce, brown sugar, vinegar, and wine. Pulse to combine.

Put the shrimp in a resealable bag and pour in the marinade. Toss to coat, then squeeze the air out, seal, and stash in the fridge while you get the grill set up.

Set your grill up for direct cook at a roaring 700°+F.  While the grill is heating up, season  the steak. For this nice, thick ribeye I used just a little kosher salt and some fresh-ground black pepper. Now is also the time to thread the shrimp onto the skewers.

When the charcoal looks like a pool of lava, toss the steak on for 90 seconds of undisturbed searing. Flip it, and let it go another 90 seconds on other other side. Flip again and check the internal temperature. I was looking for a nice medium-rare – 130°F with a hint of red at the center. It only took another 30 seconds a side to get there.

If the steak is looking good and you are getting close to your desired degree of doneness, flip the steak one more time and check again. If the steak is getting too blackened, but isn’t done yet, pull the steak from the grill while you reduce the heat (on the Big Green Egg I just shut the lower vent down). When the heat has dropped into the 500°F range, return the steak for another minute or so a side and check again.

Move the steak to a warm plate, cover with another plate, and let it rest while you grill the shrimp.

Cook the shrimp for about 2 minutes a side – just until they start to curl up and turn pink.

The Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars
The ribeye was perfect with a nice char on the outside and a tender, medium-rare interior.  The shrimp really stole the show – sweet and spicy with a great depth of flavor. Black bean sauce can be tough to find, but it’s what makes the dish. I had to turn to Amazon to find a gluten-free version, but you can find jars of the non-GF at your friendly, local Asian market.

The Nutrition
The ribeye is 2 Weight Watcher’s points per ounce. The shrimp are only 1/2 a point per ounce. We split the steak and had about 6 shrimp a piece. Add a small salad and the whole meal was only about 12 points.

ONE YEAR AGO - The Best French Onion Soup

TWO YEARS AGO - Pork in Adobo

This is my second attempt at beef short ribs. The last batch was tasty, but not as falling-apart tender as I would have liked. This time I wanted the great smoky flavor, but I also wanted to move more in the direction of classic Italian braised short ribs – less barbecue and more red wine.

Thankfully, She Cooks He Cleans has a great braised short rib recipe that I thought would adapt nicely for the Big Green Egg.

4 beef short ribs
1-2 tablespoons Dizzy Pig Cow Lick Rub
2 tablespoons tomato paste
2-3 sprigs of rosemary
2 cups red wine
2-4 cups water
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 cups beef stock

I seasoned the ribs with the rub and then set the grill up for an indirect cook at 350°F, using the plate setter to diffuse the heat and a little apple wood for smoke.

When the Egg was up to temp, I put a trivet on the plate setter, set a disposable foil pan filled with the wine and 2 cups of water on the trivet, then put the grate on top of the pan and arranged the ribs on top of that.

I smoked the ribs for two hours, then removed the grate and moved the ribs into the drip pan. I added more water until the ribs were halfway covered and let them braise in the pan for an hour.

I then moved the ribs out of the drip pan and back onto the grate over the pan and smoked them for another hour.

By now the meat was starting to fall off the bone but the meat itself wasn’t very tender. Flummoxed, I took the ribs off the grill and moved the cooking inside.

I took the meat off the bones and removed any obvious connective tissue and then put the rib meat into a Dutch oven along with the de-fatted liquid from the drip pan, the balsamic vinegar, and the beef stock. I brought the works to a boil on  the stove top, then reduced it to a simmer, put the lid on, and braised the meat for yet another hour.

I served the ribs with some of the remaining pan sauce ladled over top.

The Verdict: 3.5 out of 5 stars Not sure what I’m doing wrong here. The ribs had great beefy/smoky taste, but were still pretty tough and dry. When we get these at our favorite Italian restaurant, they start falling apart if you look at them too hard.

I’ve got one more pack of these left in the freezer, so I’d sure take suggestions on how to do the next batch. Thanks!

The Nutrition: 3 ounces is 11 Weight Watchers points, so they had better be damn tasty. These weren’t worth the calories.

One Year Ago – Shrimp Jambalaya
Two Years Ago – Spicy Orange Wings

Prime rib has become a New Year’s Eve tradition at our house. So much so that I started craving it a good two weeks ago. While researching recipes, I ran across Michael Ruhlman’s grill/roast method. It involves searing the roast on the grill, letting it rest, and then finishing it in the oven.

Perfect.

We had plans to go see a comedy show with friends, so the goal was to have all the prepping and searing done in advance and quickly finish it when we got home.

Prime Rib
1 6-pound Hereford Beef boneless ribeye roast
2 tablespoons ground black pepper
2 tablespoons dried rosemary leaves
2 tablespoons dried thyme or oregano
2 tablespoons kosher or sea salt
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon onion powder
1 tablespoon paprika

Prepping the roast started on New Year’s Eve eve. First I scored the fat cap (deckle) on the roast, making shallow diagonal cuts in a diamond pattern at about 1-inch intervals. Then I combined the salt and spices to make a rub inspired by Mrs. O’Leary’s Cow Crust from AmazingRibs. I put the roast into a jelly roll pan and start working the rub into the meat, making sure to get it into the slashes in the deckle – sprinkling, rubbing, rolling, and repeating to coat all the sides. Working over a 6-pound hunk of meat is not the time to be shy. I picked up any rub that had fallen off by bouncing the roast against it, making manly grunting sounds as needed .

When the roast was heavily crusted with rub, I moved it to a rack set over a roasting pan, and then moved the whole works to the fridge, letting the roast sit uncovered overnight.

On New Year’s Eve afternoon, I removed the roast from the fridge and let it sit out while I fired the Big Green Egg up to nuclear temps – 800°F on the dome thermometer, meaning the grate was probably about 1000°F.

I took the roast off the rack and seared it on the grate for 2 minutes on each side (considering this was a $50 piece of meat, those were some of the longest 4 minutes of my life). I removed the roast to the rack and closed the vents on the BGE to reduce the heat to 500°F. I put the roast back on the grate for another 2 more minutes on each side.

I moved the roast back to the rack and inserted a Maverick remote thermometer. While the outside was wonderfully crispy, the internal temp was only 42°F (about air temp). I stashed the roast in the garage with a disposable drip pan as a cover and went inside to get ready for our guests.

By the time we were ready to leave for the show, the internal temp had risen to 75°F. When we returned it had dropped to 60°F.

I let the oven heat to 300°F, added about a cup of water to the roasting pan to keep the juices from burning, and put the roast on the middle rack of the oven to finishing cooking.

“Wait a minute – you let a beef roast sit naked in the fridge overnight, seared it so it was still raw inside, then let is sit for 4 hours in a garage, and you still plan to serve this to guests?!? Don’t you like them? How can that be safe?”

I hear you, but it’s perfectly okay. While I wouldn’t do this with ground meat, the inside of a roast is largely a sterile environment. Any nasties that get on the meat in the fridge are not going to grow because of the cold and the salt in the rub. Searing kills anything on the meat, and 4 hours in a unheated garage in a northern climate is pretty much the same as storing it for that long in the fridge. Yes, the internal temp is 75°F, but there’s no way for anything to contaminate the inside, and finishing it in the oven again kills off anything on the outside that might give you the gleep.

It took 2 1/2 very long hours for the roast to hit 125°F internal  (good thing for appetizers, wine and great conversation!). I removed it from the rack and let it rest, covered, on a cutting board for 20 minutes while I made the Yorkshire pudding.

The Verdict: 4.5 out of 5 stars While it was midnight before the meal hit the table, our hungry (and extremely patient) friends said that it was well worth the wait. I gotta agree – the crust was thick and tasty with lots of salt and herbs while the inside was an almost perfect rosy rare.

But while the food was a hit, the timing was amiss. The show ran longer than we expected and that not only meant that the roast was late getting in the oven, but that it took longer to cook because its internal temp had dropped. Prime rib does taste wonderful with champagne, but I don’t think dining at midnight is going to become a tradition around here.

The Nutrition: Meals like this are the reason people make resolutions. Make it a great new year!

No recipes this time, just some thoughts on making the most of what’s left of our fleeting daylight and fall grilling weather.

I got inspired to rethink how I plan meals on the Big Green Egg after reading the Kingsford U: Grill Once Eat Twice post over at Nibble Me This. Chris makes the point that it takes the same amount of time and fuel to to cook two chickens as it does to cook one chicken, and you end up with more tasty grilled chicken for future meals.

Even though I’m usually just cooking for the two of us, I put this idea into practice by typically doubling or tripling most recipes on the grill. The extras end up in my lunch, or as dinner later in the week, or they get frozen off  for those nights when nobody wants to cook.

Now I’ve started working on a variation of this that I call one fire – many meals. The idea is that once you’ve gone to the effort to get the grill set up, you might as well try and pass as much food over that flame as you can.

For instance – the other night I made steak for dinner. While I was getting the BGE fired up, my dear wife said that there were also a couple of packages of chicken tenders in the fridge that she would like cooked up for salads and snacks. She had planned on baking them, but they would be ever so much better grilled, wouldn’t they?

Fire = good so, of course, they would taste better. My only question was how to go about cooking the steaks hot and fast and then modifying the heat so that the tenders would get a little char on them, but not get overcooked and dried out.

I pondered this while I prepped the steak with some fresh-ground sea salt and black pepper. I had the tenders laid out in a 9×13 pan and was hitting them with a little Dizzy Pig Swamp Venom when an idea clicked – I could leave the heat alone after the steak was done and resting and then cook the tenders quickly over the roaring flame and move then off to a baste á la  Adam Perry Lang, cut the heat, and let them finish there.

Not bad, but wouldn’t the heat move too fast through a metal pan and just scorch the tenders?  Probably. Hmmm, how about a Dutch oven? Yeah that’d work. Or, even better, use the tagine. Genius!

I poured a couple of glugs of olive oil into the base of the tagine and then added about 4 cloves of crushed garlic and about a teaspoon each lemon zest, thyme, and sage.

With the BGE running at about 650°F, I put the steak on for 2 minutes a side and then moved it off to a warm plate, covered it with another plate, and let it rest while I cooked the chicken.

The tenders went on in batches. With the heat this high, by the time I finished putting the last row of tenders on the grate the first row was ready to be flipped. Once they had some nice grill marks on each side (but where still pretty raw on the inside) I moved them off the heat to the tagine, making sure to toss them a bit in the oil.

When all the tenders were in the tagine, I swirled another glug of olive oil over the top, put the lid on, and moved the tagine to the grill.  I closed the lid on the BGE, shut the bottom vent down to reduce the heat, and went inside for a lovely steak dinner.

When I checked on them 30 minutes later, the tenders were done and basting in their own juices. I moved everything inside, removed the lid, and let them cool before packaging.

Cooking this way does take a bit more time and fuel, but not much more effort. You’re essentially letting your downtime and residual heat work for you. For this cook I spent maybe an extra ten minutes packaging off the tenders, but we ended up with a steak dinner, a dinner of tenders and veggies the next night, chicken salad lunches for a couple of days, and about a dozen tenders frozen off for chicken stew the next week.

Not bad for a little extra work.

No recipe here – just some quick and easy steaks on the grill as a treat after a day of cleaning out the garage.

I set the Big Green Egg up for a direct cook at high (500°F+) temp, seasoned the ribeyes on both sides with some Dizzy Pig Raising The Steaks seasoning, and slapped them on the grill for about 2 minutes a side.

I almost never order steak when we eat out anymore. Even with minimal prep and seasoning like this, I can consistently turn out better steaks in the Egg than I can get in most restaurants.

I’ve been trying all summer to make a decent blackened steak. So far none of the steaks have been complete disasters (although the butter fire was pretty impressive), but they just weren’t that perfect combination of tasty charred crust and warm, juicy center that I’ve been dreaming of.

So when my dear wife brought home this absolute beast of a ribeye, I knew I had the perfect candidate for my next blackening attempt – solid, compact, well over a pound, and damn near 1 3/4 inches thick. It was a steak that almost demanded to be blackened.

I melted a couple of tablespoons on butter on a dinner plate and rolled this bad boy in it to coat all sides. I then liberally dusted the steak with fresh ground back pepper and ground sea salt. I let the steak sit at room temp while I fired up the grill.

I set the Big Green Egg up for a direct cook at a sub-nuclear temp (600°F). When the temp had stabilized I put my Bayou Classic cast iron griddle directly on the grate and let it heat up for about 15 minutes.

I carefully put the steak on the griddle and let the sizzling begin. I let it go for 2 minutes, then flipped it over and went another 2 minutes. I flipped it again and kept flipping the steak about once a minute until I could feel the meat start to firm up a little under the pressure of the tongs.

A quick check with my Thermapen showed 115°F. I wanted it to end up at a nice, pink medium-rare. With a steak this big I knew there would be a lot of carry-over heat, so only needed to hit 120°F internal. I gave it one more minute on the griddle and then set it off to a plate to rest for 15 minutes.

The [rating 5/5]
My dear wife took one bite and said, “This is the best steak you’ve ever made.”

We have a winner!

In fact, I don’t have enough stars for this one. I’ve made lots of tasty steaks in my life, but this one was perfectly done. There was almost no ring of gray, over-done meat at all -  just a thick, tasty char surrounding a tender medium-rare steak. I was planning on serving it with a little bleu cheese sauce, but it was so good we had it eaten before I remembered the sauce.

My dear wife is back! Whew, it was getting close there. Almost ran out of salami, Doritos, and clean underwear .

To celebrate, I re-made the Black ‘n’ Bleu steak we had right before she left. Only this time I switched to bottom round sirloin steaks and skipped the cast iron griddle.

I set the BGE up for a direct cook at about 650°F. After coating the steaks with olive oil, I seasoned them with a little fresh-ground black pepper and sea salt, and tossed them on the grate.

These were nice, thick steaks, so I ended up going about 3 minutes a side to get medium rare.

The Verdict: 4 out of 5 stars

Getting better – the blue cheese topping is still a winner, and the steaks were closer to being done to my liking, but I missed the heavy char. I also prefer the firmer structure of the strip steak to the grainier bottom sirloin. Just going to have to try again, damn .

My dear wife is gone on a vacation with her mother, so the cats and I are baching it. When I asked her what she wanted for her last meal on the Egg before she left, she said she had a craving for a big ol’ steak topped with bleu cheese.

I decided to try a black ‘n’ bleu version using a nice pair of a dry-aged New York strips and my cast iron griddle. The black is the nicely charred black pepper crust and the bleu is the simple bleu cheese sauce on top.

2 – 8 to 10-ounce New York strip steaks
Olive oil
Freshly-ground black peppercorns
Kosher or sea salt
2 tablespoons bleu cheese crumbles
1 tablespoon heavy cream

I drizzle both sides of the the steaks with olive oil and then seasoned them with a few grinds of salt and pepper. I let the steaks sit out at room temperature while I got the grill fired up and made the sauce.

I set the Big Green Egg up for a direct cook at nuclear temps (700+°F). When the grill was roaring like a dragon, I put the griddle directly on the grate and let it heat up for about 15 minutes.

I made the cheese sauce by working the cream into the crumbled cheese with a  fork until everything is combined, but still a little chunky. I stuck it in the fridge to set up a little.

Been wondering where the bungled part comes in? See that harmless looking griddle? I tossed the steaks on there for what was supposed to be 3 minutes per side.

Let’s just say that there was much smoking and sizzling. So much so that I flipped the steaks early at 2 minutes. Whoa – that’s some serious char.  By the time I got my Thermapen out of the drawer and checked the temp they were both at 135°F internal and headed into that dreaded grey zone called “well done.”

Hoping against hope, I pulled the steaks off and let them rest for 10 minutes. Then topped them each with a scoop of the bleu cheese sauce and served them with a salad, baked potato, and sauteed mushrooms.

The Verdict: 3 out of 5 stars
I feared the steaks were ruined, but they ended up tasting great – the black pepper offset the bleu cheese in a way that made the steaks rich, but not over the top. The char was perfect and the steaks were still a bit juicy, but they were badly over-cooked.

Luckily my dear wife is very forgiving and enjoyed her meal. I’ll try these again, but next time I’ll dial down the heat to the 500°F range and flip them once a minute, checking the temp more often.

She’s back in 10 days, maybe she’ll send home fresh salmon, and we’ll have surf and turf!

My dear wife put this together for me as a stellar lunch following a load of lawn work.  Have I got it good or what?

I’ve been looking for a new veggie pan for a while. The first one I bought was one of those fry pans with holes in the side and a removable handle. It was okay, but the veggies would more stew in their own juices than they would roast. Then I got the Weber grill pan (which need a little “reforming” to fit on the Big Green Egg). It’s great for getting a quick char on flat rounds of bread or slices of onion, or to hold a bunch of oysters, but it doesn’t let the heat get around the food so one side tends to burn before the other side is done.

Enter the steel grill roaster from Williams-Sonoma, a gift from my dear wife. It’s perforated stainless steel, so the food gets directly exposed to the flame, but it’s raised up a bit (via a grid under the pan) so it cooks more evenly.

To try it out I tossed a couple of sliced onions, some halved mushrooms, some sliced yellow and green  peppers in a bowl and hit them with a glug of balsamic vinegar, a couple of glugs of olive oil, and a few grinds of sea salt. I gave them a shake and let them marinate while I got the grill ready.

I got the grill up to 400°F and put the grill roaster on by itself for about 5 minutes to heat it up.  Using a slotted spoon, I moved the veggies to the pan, reserving the marinade.

I roasted the veggies for about 10 minutes, stirring them often, until the peppers had softened and everything had a little char on it. I took the roaster off the heat and dumped the veggies back into the bowl with the marinade and gave them a shake to coat them.

Then I cranked the heat up to about 750°F and give these bad boys a no-frills, hot & fast grilling.

The Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars
The steak was great, but for once the meat isn’t the hero of this story. The grill roaster did an excellent job and I plan on giving it a real workout this summer. The perforations let the juices drain off so the veggies roasted instead of stewed. At 12×14 it’s plenty big – I could have done twice the amount of veggies and still had room to move things around. The raised design and slopping sides keep everything cook evenly.

Clean up went pretty well. It’s dishwasher safe, but the label (yes, I did read it) says to hand wash. I just let it soak overnight and wiped it off the next day. Since it’s solid metal with holes in it, not mesh, there weren’t a lot of surfaces that food could stick to.

When is a steak not a steak? When it’s a beefy tri-tip roast. This cut from the bottom of the sirloin really lends itself to simple seasoning and quick cooking. I tend to treat it just like a big, thick steak and grill it pretty hot and fast.

1 tri-tip roast (about 2 1/2 pounds)
2 tablespoons kosher salt
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon freshly ground black pepper

Pull the roast out of the fridge about an hour before you plan to cook it. Combine the salt, garlic, and pepper in a small bowl. Rub onto all sides of the roast.

Set your grill up for a direct cook at medium-high (450°F) heat.

Put the roast on the grill and cook about 5 minutes per side (this one was thick enough that there where 3 of them), for about 15 minutes total. Turn roast up onto its flat butt end and continue to cook until it reaches 125°F internal (about another 5 minutes). Because this cut is so lean you really don’t want to cook it much beyond medium-rare.

Remove from the grill, let rest for 10 minutes before slicing across the grain into thin slices.

The Verdict: 4 out of 5 stars
The roast/steak tasted great, but was a little chewy. Not sure if I didn’t cut the slices thin enough or if I erred too far on the rare side of medium rare.

Fortunately, I have another one of these bad boys in the freezer to play with. Better luck next time, eh?

I’m a sucker for real corned beef hash. Not the crap in the cans, but the stuff you get at some roadside diner where the waitress serves your cuppa joe in those stocky white mugs, the short-order cook has a tattoo that says ”Mom”, and you can order breakfast all day long.

2 cups frozen hash brown potatoes
6 ounces diced corned beef (about 1 1/2 cups)
4 eggs
1/2 medium onion, chopped
1/2 medium yellow bell pepper, chopped
1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon fresh-ground black pepper
2 tablespoons water
1 teaspoon kosher salt

You’ll need a medium non-stick skillet with a lid. Heat the oil in the pan over medium heat. Fill the pan with alternating layers of potatoes, corned beef, onion, and bell pepper. Season with salt and pepper.  Press mixture to flatten with spatula. Cook uncovered until bottom begins to brown, about 5 minutes. Flip and flatten again. Continue to cook, flipping every 5 minutes, until hash is mostly browned and the onion and bell pepper are tender (about 10 – 15 minutes).

With the back of a spoon, make 4 shallow wells in the hash for the eggs. Crack the eggs into the wells, pour the water into the middle of the hash, and cover with the lid.

Let cook until the egg whites are set, but the yolks are still runny (my favorite), about 5 minutes.

The Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars
Eating these I could almost hear the ring of the “order’s up” bell – crispy hash browns with tender bits of corned beef and all that lovely yolk oozing over top – perfect!

My plan was to take the Adam Perry Lang “butter-bombed” recipe that I had previously tried on a sirloin and apply it to the last pack of t-bones that we had in the freezer. But they were such a lovely pair of steaks, that I decided to do minimal pre-seasoning on them and just hit them with a bit of butter baste at the end.

I fired up the Big Green Egg and set it up for a hot (600°F+) direct cook.

I combined the following in my favorite little cast iron melting pot and warmed it just long enough on the grate to melt the butter:

2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 gloves garlic, crushed
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon ground sea salt
1 teaspoon dried thyme

The t-bones got coated with a little olive oil, a light coat of Dizzy Pig’s Raising the Steaks, and a couple of grinds of sea salt before I tossed them on the grill.

I grilled them for 90 seconds, rotated them 90 degrees and gave them another 30 seconds. Then I flipped them, basted them with the butter sauce, and grilled them for another 90 seconds. I flipped them back over, basted, and let them cook until the thickest steak hit a medium-rare 125°F internal (after 30 seconds on the grill).

I quickly basted both sides again, pulled them off the grill and onto a warm plate. I covered them with another plate and let them rest 10 minutes before serving.

The Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars
Wow, these were good! Nice char on the outside and medium-rare on the inside. I like the contrast on a t-bone between the beefy loin side and the buttery soft tenderloin side.  As for seasoning, I think this was a great compromise. The full-on marinating and bombing from Adam Perry Lang’s BBQ 25 can be more than the steak really needs, but just hitting it with the baste at the end really bumps up the flavor.

It was warm enough over the weekend that we could finally sit out on our deck. To celebrate, I made up these Mediterranean-ish kabobs. Marinating the meat overnight not only added a ton of flavor, but helped to keep it moist and tender despite the high grill temps and short cooking times.

Step 1 – Get Everything Marinating

Beef Kabobs

1 1/2 pounds beef sirloin, cut into large cubes
1/4 cup flat-leaf parsley leaves
4 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon dried rosemary
1  teaspoon dried oregano (Turkish if you can get it)
1/4 cup olive oil
Juice of 1 lemon (about 3 tablespoons)
2 teaspoons kosher salt

Put the garlic and salt in a food processor and give it a spin until the garlic is minced. Add the parsley, rosemary, oregano, oil, and lemon juice. Process until well-mixed.

Put the steak in a zip-top bag and cover with the marinade. Toss to coat. Squeeze the air out of the bag, seal it, and put it in the fridge to marinate for at least 4 hours, overnight is better.

Chicken Kabobs

1 1/2 pounds boneless, skinless chicken breast, cut into large cubes
1 cup plain Greek yogurt (full fat)
1 tablespoon Aleppo pepper (or 2 teaspoons dried crushed red pepper plus 1 teaspoon Hungarian sweet paprika)
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon dried oregano (Turkish if you can get it)

In a small bowl, combine yogurt, Aleppo pepper, salt, black pepper, and oregano. Put the chicken in a zip-top bag and cover with the yogurt mixture. Toss to coat. Squeeze the air out of the bag, seal it, and put it in the fridge to marinate for at least 4 hours, overnight is better.

Step 2 – Make the Tzatziki

Tzatziki

1 cup plain Greek yogurt (full fat)
2 tablespoons feta cheese (crumbled)
2 teaspoons kosher salt
1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 teaspoon dried oregano (again, Turkish if you can get it)
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons mint, finely chopped
1 small cucumber, peeled and grated

Combine every thing in a small bowl. Cover and refrigerate overnight.

Step 3 – The Cook

Veggies (and Fruit)

3 bell peppers (red, yellow, and green), chopped into 1  1/2 inch pieces
8 ounces fresh mushrooms
1 large yellow onion, sliced
1/2 cup dried apricots
1/2 cup dried plums
1/2 dried cherries
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon garam masala

When you are ready to grill, toss the veggies and dried fruit  together with the oil, vinegar, salt, and garam masala in a large bowl. Let sit while you bring the grill up to temperature.

You’ll need 8 to 10 bamboo skewers. Soak them in water for at least an hour.

Set the grill up for a direct cook over very hot (500°F +) heat.

Using a veggie basket, grill the veggies and fruit (stirring often) until the peppers soften and everything gets a little char on them, about 10 minutes. Remove the veggies to a bowl and keep warm.

Remove the meat from their respective marinades and thread onto skewers (the flat ones work great as they keep the meat from spinning around).  Grill the chicken about 6 minutes per side. Grill the beef for about 3 minutes per side. In both cases you’re looking for some crispy bits on the outside without overcooking the meat.

When the meat is done, remove from the grill and let rest for about 5 minutes. Then remove the meat from the skewers, toss with the veggies, and serve over a rice pilaf with a dollop of the tzatziki.

The Verdict: 5 out of 5 stars
I really liked the way the flavors of these individual dishes complimented each other – juicy bites of charred-yet-succulent meat, sweet and savory veggies, tangy and refreshing tzatziki, and the rich blend of herbs and spices bringing it all together. It was a little United Nations on a stick.

This is one of those “surprise” steaks that pop up every so often when we get a quarter of beef from the butcher. The wrapping paper says sirloin, but instead of a nice, thick steak it turns out to be a very thin roast that’s been folded over on itself. It’s not a bad piece of meat, but it’s just not what I was expecting when I dug it out of the deep freeze.

I’ve found Adam Perry Lang’s butter bombing method from his Serious Barbecue book to be the way to go when tackling thin steaks like this that could easily dry out and get tough without a little help.

Marinade
1 thin sirloin steak, about 1 1/2 pounds
1 teaspoon crushed hot red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon hot water
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon soy sauce
4 cloves garlic
1 teaspoon Montreal steak seasoning
1 teaspoon dried oregano
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 teaspoons olive oil

Put the garlic and salt in a food processor and give it a whirl until the garlic is finely minced. Add the pepper flakes, hot water, Worcestershire, mustard, honey, soy sauce, steak seasoning, oregano, and oil. Pulse to combine.

Put the steak in a large zip-top bag and cover with the marinade. Squeezed the air out of the bag, seal it, and toss it in the fridge to marinate for at least a couple of hours, overnight is best.

Resting Butter
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 tablespoon dried parsley
1 teaspoon dried thyme
1 teaspoon dried rosemary
Juice of half a lemon
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
4 garlic cloves, chopped
1/2 teaspoon crushed hot red pepper flakes
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 teaspoon fresh-ground black pepper

Set your grill up for a direct cook over high (500°F+) heat.

Combine the butter, parsley, thyme, rosemary, lemon juice, Worcestershire, garlic, red pepper, salt, and pepper in a shallow baking pan (I use a 9×13 disposable foil pan that I can set right on the grill).

Heat the pan, stirring to combine everything as the butter melts. Set pan beside the grill.

Remove the steak from the marinade and slap it on the hottest part of the grill. Let it sear for 60 seconds, then flip it over and let it go another 60 seconds.

Move the steak off into the butter sauce. Flip it a couple of times to coat both sides with all that herby/buttery wonderfulness. Return the steak to the grill for another 30 seconds on each side – it will smoke and flare and start to burn, but that’s kinda the idea.

Move the steak off into the butter sauce and give it another flip. Let it rest for 10 minutes. Move the steak to a cutting board, reserve the butter mix and keep the pan warm.

Trim any fat or connective tissue, and then slice the meat on a diagonal into 1/4-inch slices. Put the sliced steak and any accumulated meat juices from the cutting board back into butter mix. Give the pan a shake to coat the meat.

The Verdict: 4 out of 5 stars
Too much of a good thing? This sirloin had a good, beefy flavor, but was cut so thin that it would have been hard to cook without drying it out and making it chewy. The marinade and the butter mix kept it moist and tender even when cooked to medium. But while this was exactly what this steak needed, the steak was so thin that the herbs and red pepper almost overwhelmed the meat. The “bombing” would have been perfect on a thicker steak, or if the steak was playing more of a minor role, like in a salad.