Guest Post: Rubbed Flank Steak with Horseradish Cream

An integral part of the cooking experience is sharing food and recipes with friends and family; that's also an integral part of this blog, as a matter of fact. In that spirit, I was delighted when a friend and recent college graduate came to me with a story of heroism in the kitchen. I was even happier when I succeeded in cajoling him into writing a guest post for The B.A. Gourmet!

I'm very proud to present this story and recipe from Ryan K. and would like to take this opportunity to solict my readers for tales of their own post-college experiences cooking for themselves. There's no reason why this blog can't be a community experience.

Without further ado...

Hey BA Gourmet:

Long-time fan, first time poster. Wanted to submit a simple recipe by way of bragging about some culinary quick thinking over the weekend.

To preface this story, you have to know that the starring kitchen appliance in this story is a shoddy, 70s-style all gas stove with gas burners on top. Practically everything is wrong with this thing, and we've been begging the landlords to replace it since we moved in. Some of its more charming idiosyncrasies: if the oven is on, you can't light the burners; you can't store anything in the drawer underneath the stove since, naturally, the interior burners are located there, rendering any metal cooking sheet capable of melting human flesh; there's no thermometer save for the temperature dial, and there's no way in hell that dial is correct. Actually, to correct that last bit, my girlfriend had purchased an internal, clip-to-the-cooking-rack thermometer that works quite nicely.

And it's here that our sticky situation unfolds. We were setting out to make the delicious steak recipe below. Having preheated the oven to cook the potatoes and the asparagus, we were just about to set the oven to broil to throw the steak in, when the temperature knob stopped serving it's one function, i.e., turning. Later, upon further inspection, we learned that the oven had gotten so hot on it's quest for broiling temperatures that it had melted the dial, which was now spinning around the post rather than causing it to turn. Wonderful.

Meanwhile, the steak was only getting colder in the oven and my girlfriend's ire was drawing hotter. I can see her face begin to pout, mixed with the righteous anger of an innocent victim. She takes great pride in her skill in the kitchen (she's amazingly adept, with a disarming ease to her movements), and she fears even the smallest mistake will do irreparable harm to her reputation (it won't). But right now, we were teetering on the disastrous meal of raw steak and a side of miserable woman.

To talk her off the cliff, I suggested that I could cook the steak in a frying pan. To try to give the steak the same blackened exterior we were going for by broiling, I grabbed a pad of butter, melted it in the skillet, and cooked the steak for 6-7 minutes on each side. The result was delicious, save for a slightly tougher exterior than was desirable. At the very least, it was more satisfying than sulking girlfriend.

The recipe (from myrecipes.com):
Rubbed Flank Steak with Horseradish Cream
Yield: 6 servings (serving size: 3 ounces steak and 1 tablespoon horseradish cream)

Ingredients
STEAK:
1 (1 1/2-pound) flank steak
1/4 cup rye or bourbon whiskey
2 tablespoons low-sodium soy sauce

HORSERADISH CREAM:
1/3 cup plain fat-free yogurt
2 tablespoons prepared horseradish
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 large garlic clove, minced

RUB:
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon chili powder
1 1/2 teaspoons black pepper
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8 teaspoon salt
Cooking spray

Preparation
To prepare steak, trim fat from steak. Place whiskey and soy sauce in a large zip-top plastic bag. Add steak; seal and marinate in refrigerator 24 hours, turning bag occasionally.To prepare horseradish cream, combine yogurt, horseradish, mustard, and garlic in a small bowl. Cover and chill.To prepare rub, combine sugar and next 5 ingredients (sugar through salt). Remove steak from bag; discard marinade. Rub sugar mixture over steak; chill 30 minutes.Prepare grill or broiler.Place steak on a grill rack or broiler pan coated with cooking spray, and cook 8 minutes on each side or until desired degree of doneness. Cut steak diagonally across grain into thin slices. Serve with the horseradish cream.

Notes: We actually didn't get a chance to marinate the steak for longer than a few hours, but it was still delicious. Very flavorful. We coupled this with roasted red potatoes and roasted asparagus. Well, as above, they were supposed to be roasted, but we had to come up with a contingency plan, specifically, the potatoes were put in the toaster oven, and the asparagus (that we simply tossed in olive oil, salt, and pepper) was roasted in a skillet.