Sake Steak with Cardamom Rice

Lowell’s up for the weekend, so we’re having something special, that won’t keep me in the kitchen on my own all night.

2 x 150g fillet steak

200g Basmati rice

2 cardamom pods

2 tbsp chopped coriander

Marinade

1 tsp English mustard

2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tbsp garlic oil

Sauce

70ml sake

1 tbsp soy sauce

1 tsp Worcestershire sauce

1 tsp English mustard

This is elegant but easy. A word on the ingredients. Get what you can, but I think Worcestershire sauce is Lea & Perrins, mustard is Colmans and soy sauce should be the dark kind. If you can’t get hold of sake, use sherry, as long as it’s good enough that you’d want to drink it on it’s own.

Combine the steaks and marinade ingredients in a freezer bag and marinate for a few hours in the fridge. We did this in the morning and then went out for the day. Gave it all a good massage when we got back and it was good to go.

Leave the steaks out to come up to room temperature. There’s no point in putting them in a hot pan if they’re freezing cold. Lowell & I are reading The Woman in White to each other and we have time to squeeze a whole new chapter in. It’s getting chilling. Who in that house do we trust?

If you don’t have a rice cooker, get one. The rice goes in. along with the cardamom pods (Bash them first). The rice will be perfect and hot, whenever the rest of the meal is ready.

Heat a griddle pan until screaming hot and give the steaks 2 minutes on each side. Wrap them up in foil and allow them to rest.

In your smallest saucepan, heat up the sake or sherry and evaporate the alcohol off. Add the other sauce ingredients. Unwrap the steaks and pour the juice into the sauce pan.

Slice the steak thinly on the diagonal and serve on a bed of cardamom-scented rice and pour the sauce over. Sprinkle the coriander on top.

We’re having this with a pinot noir that has a nose reminiscent of coffee beans. He’s starting to feel at home in my flat and I’m doing my best to encourage that. There are no left overs, which I’m taking as a good sign. Dessert has to be plain Madagascan vanilla ice cream and coffee. Elegant. Sincere.  Lowell.