When it’s really hot outside and it’s lunch time, I want something light — not heavy — but still really, really satisfying.
This Summer Steak Salad recipe hits the spot. Ah, refreshing!
Check it out!
Summer Steak Salad
This entrée highlights some of the freshest flavors of the season, including tomatoes and basil. Flank steak, sliced thin, lends itself nicely to salads.
Yield
4 servings
Ingredients
1 (1-pound) flank steak, trimmed
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 pound haricots verts, trimmed
Cooking spray
8 (1/2-ounce) slices French bread
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
1 tablespoon water
2 teaspoons extravirgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/8 teaspoon sugar
6 cups trimmed arugula
1 cup torn fresh basil
4 medium tomatoes, each cut into 6 wedges
2 hard-cooked large eggs, each cut into 4 wedges
Preparation
Sprinkle both sides of steak with 1/2 teaspoon salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper. Let stand at room temperature 20 minutes.
Cook haricots verts in boiling water for 2 minutes or until crisp-tender. Drain; rinse under cold water. Drain.
Prepare grill.
Pat steak dry with a paper towel. Place steak on grill rack coated with cooking spray; grill 5 minutes on each side or until desired degree of doneness. Add bread to grill rack; grill 2 minutes on each side or until lightly browned. Remove steak and bread from grill. Lightly cover steak with foil; let stand 10 minutes. Cut steak diagonally across the grain into thin slices.
Combine vinegar and next 5 ingredients (through sugar) in a medium bowl; stir with a whisk. Add haricots verts, arugula, and basil to vinegar mixture; toss well. Place about 1 1/2 cups arugula mixture on each of 4 plates. Top each serving with 3 ounces steak, 6 tomato wedges, 2 egg wedges, and 2 slices grilled bread.
Wine note: With grilled steak, I usually opt for a full throttle cabernet sauvignon. But this is a salad, and the peppery character of the arugula, the greenness of the basil and beans, and the acidity of the tomatoes are more important than the meat itself. So serve this with a bone-dry rosé, which combines the crispness of a white wine with the fruit and body of a red. A fabulous choice is the powerhouse Tablas Creek Rosé 2005 from California’s Paso Robles region ($26). -Karen MacNeil
Photo and recipe courtesy of MyRecipes.com.
September 8th, 2009 at 8:44 am
This entry totally saved my hash the other day. I’ve become very interested in steak recently, but as I live in Beijing finding ready-to-cook steaks is very expensive (meat imported from Australia). However, we have tons of butchers, and I’ve found a place that has gorgeous cuts of filet for very cheap. Meat located, I began frantically perusing the internet for various marinades that could be made with the ingredients I had at hand. First go-round was a huge success; my 9 year old son ate 3 steaks (I have no idea where he put them. I’m a big guy, and I couldn’t get past one and a half). Puffed up with my success, I made a red wine vinegar based marinade, threw in ten steaks, and marinated them in the fridge overnight. Came home from work, pan fried the first one and gave it to my boy, and went back into the kitchen to finish cooking the others. When I came out, he’d only eaten a bit: “A little sour,” he told me. WAY too much red vine vinegar in the marinade, and I’m left with ten pieces of meat that taste of vinegar rather than meat.
Well, I’d come across this lovely site, and the salad idea stuck in my craw. The next day I assembled a massive bowl of mixed organic greens, cherry tomatoes, red onions, avocado (expensive here, but worth it), and the sliced up 10 steaks. Easy on the Italian dressing and it was perfect! Polished off the last of the bowl for lunch today. Bonus points: my wife, who almost never eats red meat and so is not usually a fan of my cooking, loved the salad and so I finally made something that she really enjoyed.