Broiling 101

Time to get your broil on. Broiling is just like grilling up side down. Think about it.

Step 1: Place item to broil on broiling pan. (Now if you don't know what a broiling pan is, look under your oven for that pan that came with the oven. The one that you never use. It looks like a pan with a grate over it) This is just like grilling.

Step 2: Place the item really really close to the heat source in your oven. Mine is on the top.

Step 3: Broil!!!!

Just like grilling but the heat source is on top of the food. There are a couple of pros to boiling verses grilling.

1. No smoky taste. (if you don't like that)

2. No flare ups because the drippings are not dripping onto the heat source.

3. You don't have to go outside. :) ( ok so this is not a big deal for us Arizona folk but I would think that you live in Chicago this make be a plus if you are craving a grilled steak in the dead of winter) Plus turning on the oven to a really high temperature may actually warm your house as well. :) Double bonus. Of course when it is 110 degrees outside. Staying inside might be better anyways right?

The first broiling application is steak. Flank steak which in my opinion is a great cut of meat. Flank steak is a cut of beef that comes from the belly of the cow. Because it is from the belly, the cow does not use these muscles as much as say the back so there is a lot of fat running through the meat. Fat (in meat) equals flavor. Don't you wish it was the same for people. Now I am not one to just eat a big piece of fat (like my hubby) but I really like flank steak. Because it is relativity cheap (for steak) and a large piece of meat, it can serve a lot of people or meals in our case which is why I have cooked it a lot.

The first step is to create the marinade. This marinade was made in my new HUGE food processor. I put one onion, garlic, ginger, white wine, soy sauce, worcestershire sauce, honey and extra virgin olive oil. And don't forget salt and pepper. Go easy on the salt because both soy sauce and worcestershire sauce has a lot of salt in it. We pretty much ALWAYS have these ingredients in our house which I was very happy to see. I put all of these ingredients into the processor and chopped it up into a smooth paste/liquid. I put the steak into a zip lock bag and poured the marinate into the bag and into the fridge it goes for the next night. :)

In the afternoon before cooking I took the steak out to let it come to room temperature. I then took the steak out of the bag, wiped off some of the marinade and the placed it on a rack to let it really come to room temperature and dry a little bit.

Then I turned on the oven to 500 degrees or your broil on your oven and then move the rack to the top of the oven. You want the item for broiling within 2 inches of the heat source. And really REALLY 2 inches. (I did not do this :( ) Then let it warm up. Place the steak on the broiling pan and into the oven. Here was the bad news. I do not have a broiling pan. Obviously the person who lived here before us took it with them. I made a makeshift pan by putting a cooking rack on a cookie sheet with foil under it for easy clean up and place it into the oven. After 4 minutes on one side you flip. When I flipped mine, it definitely was not cooking so after the 4 minutes I moved my meat up to the very VERY top. After another 4 minutes and turned. After 8 minutes (or 12 in my case) I removed the steak and let it rest for 5 minutes.

After resting for 5 minutes I cut. On one side of the steak was a perfect medium rare and the other 1/2 was rare!!! One side had a beautiful crust on it and the other rare side did not. I served the med rare pieces with garlic toast and peas or green balls as they are called at our house. Symon and I both enjoyed the steak but found it better if you ate a piece of steak with a piece of garlic bread because it added the crunch factor. Which means added texture in food language. Almost like an open steak sandwich. It was really good. I really liked the marinade flavor. Both Symon and I felt that if we had cooked it closer to the heat source then we could have gotten the crust on the steak that we liked.

The best part of this steak was the next day I used the rare pieces and sautéed them with red and yellow bell peppers and some spices and placed into a tortilla. Now lets face it. EVERYTHING is better in a tortilla right? :) Give me your thoughts on broiling and what your favorite thing is to broil. :) Next up.... breakfast.