Brantology.com lives on! I’m back, after disappearing for awhile. My site, brantology.com, re-appears. Did you miss me? 🙂
To “Stop Complaining” was my lesson here. There’s always a lesson to learn when things don’t go our way –
I called my web host outfit on the 30th of August to say “My site is running a bit slow, can you check your cache over there, and see if maybe that’s the reason?” She came back to say, no it’s all clear but have you checked yours? Mine was clear. Then she says wait a minute, it looks like you’re close to using all your site’s available memory, that’s why it’s running slow, so you have two choices – either delete posts, especially those music videos that take up a lot of memory – OR – you can migrate to our super-spiffy 100 gig Pro Platform? I chose the Pro Platform whereby she said, “just to let you know, it will take 24 hours to migrate this site over, so your site will be unavailable during that time, are you good with that?” I was fine with that. The problem was her 24 hours turned into a total of 12 days wherein my site has been offline! How many hours is that? A bunch, anyway, twelve days later and I’m back now friends.
Let me tell you about dinner tonight – I cooked a ribeye (1″ thick) that had been in my refrigerator waiting to be called up and that call came tonight. I decided to place it on the stove instead of the pit or oven. I wanted to try a recipe I found online where a guy convinced me he knew what he was talking about? His approach is to heat some oil in an iron skillet until it’s smoking hot then searing a ribeye very briefly on both sides. Then he pours in a healthy amount of brandy and lights it on fire. Yes, you read that correctly, lights it on fire. That’s where the recipe got “complicated”. I had to decide between some very cheap orange brandy in my cupboard [forever] vs. some French Courvoisier I had only a remnant of left. Both are 40% alcohol so either one would ignite on fire. The problem was, I had to fast-forward my taste buds to interpret this cook’s idea of a sauce consisting of blue cheese + horseradish + sour cream. I chose the Courvoisier, that cheap brandy would have disappointed I thought.
Now it’s time to pour the Courvoisier over the steak and that was no issue, the mixture just began bubbling as steam rose up in my face. What didn’t go well, I was having difficulty lighting the steak on fire, so I kept clicking the lighter closer and even closer to the pan. Suddenly a mini-explosion happened and as I flew back my right arm briefly engulfed in flames! Surmise to say the flavor of that steak was “almost worth” getting killed over? 🙂 I will try this recipe again on a thick cut ribeye as I’m thinking the second time is a charm? 😉
Menu
V.S. or V.S.O.P.? We used some rot gut Brandy with everclear mixed in to “flame in Courvoisier”! Recipe sounds good. Did it call for ribeye?
I think the label said V.S.O.P., I already disposed of it. It wasn’t cheap I remember that part, probably purchased it back in 2018 or 19 with intentions to drink as a nightcap. Once it got down to only a few ounces left I thought it might be handy one day to cook with. I was digging in the back of the pantry behind the cheap brandy when I found it, I forgot I even had it.
I’ll post below the part of his recipe I copied for my directions. I’m guessing this guy is somewhere in Great Britain based on the nomenclature he uses. He specified ribeye, but certainly a filet would work here, and maybe even a good cut of NY strip? I’m not a filet person, there’s something about that taste. If you try this simple recipe do not skip the mixture of his sauce at the end. Wow is that good. I used too much sour cream and had to add more of the others so I would recommend going easy on that but blue cheese and a good quality horseradish sauce is excellent together for this steak. I recommend keeping it on the side though as you would for prime rib:
“Our local butcher gets grass-fed Welsh mountain beef from a farm less than 5 miles away. He will cut it to any thickness you want – I go for something more than an inch and half thick. Typically we will have 10 ounces or more for each steak.
My cooking process:
1. Season with sea salt and freshly ground black pepper and leave the raw steak on the kitchen counter ( while keeping an eye on the dog) for at least half an hour to get up to room temperature.
2. Get my heavy iron pan and smear the inside with oil – just a coating. Then put some heat into it until it is starting to smoke.
3. Lay the steaks carefully into the smoking hot pan. Turn them over after about 45 seconds and give then another 45 seconds.
4. Reach for the brandy. Pour a big glug all over the steaks and set it on fire. This is a lot of fun, but obviously a bit dangerous (mind you, the dog will now have run away).
5. Take the steaks and put them in a barely warm oven to rest. The oven needs to be below a temperature where the meat is actually cooking.
6. Pour a splash of red wine into the pan and use a small whisk to mix it with all the tasty crud left over from the immolation. This can then be extended to make a sauce. My favourite is a mixture of blue stilton, Dijon mustard ( or creamed horseradish) and creme fraiche.”