I created this dish from scratch in April, I was tired of making my go to Chicken Nachos and Enchiladas, I felt like getting creative with beef. So I did what I do best, Brainstormed. I wanted to make a fork tender beef dish with a sweet and salty aspect to it, lets dive into my though process creating this dish
Vegetables
The only vegetables that I incorporated in this dish are sweet potatoes and pickled red onions. I had no real game plan for this dish, I improvised the whole thing. So my wife and I went to Wegmans, picked up some organic brasing beef meat, beef stock, and feta cheese. When we got home I thought to roast the sweet potato with salt, pepper, garlic powder and a touch of cinnamon instead of boiling it, then pureeing it. What came out was an incredibly flavorful puree. After pureeing it, I added a little coconut oil. The puree was that simple to make.
Luckily, in that week I had the sudden urge to make pickles from scratch. I used white distilled vinegar, water, sugar and McCormick pickling spice which includes coriander, allspice, cardamom, bay leaf, ginger and more. Long story short, this pickling solution had flavor and it went to good use in this beef dish. The acidity cuts the fattiness from the beef. Check the pickled red onion recipe out here.
I marinated my beef for about 1 hour in red wine vingear, salt, pepper, garlic powder, chili powder (got to look in cabinet to remember what other seasonings I used) . After marinating I added it to my instapot (I won it as a first place prize in a cooking competition) with some olive oil to sear, after searing I added beef stock, thyme, more salt and pepper. I let this braise for about 2.5 hours and it was extremly fork tender and the broth/jus had good flavor.
I then plated up by placing the puree with a spoon in a circular shape, then stacking the braised beef in the center. Next I thought, this looks bland, So I looked in the fridge for garnishes and bam, pickled red onions that I have yet to use were there. I placed them in no particular fashion, so it wouldn’t look uniform. Then I crumbled feta cheese on, spooned some of the jus around the puree and we had a complete dish.
| Ingredients | Quantity |
| Beef, Stewing meat | 1 lb |
| Beef Stock | 1 cup |
| Sweet potato, peeled and diced | 2 medium |
| Coconut oil | 1 tbsp |
| oil for roasting potatoes | as neeeded |
| Pickled Red Onion | 12 – 18 slices |
| Cinnamon | 1 tsp |
| Salt | tt |
| Pepper | 1 tsp |
| Garlic Powder | 1 tbsp |
| Red Wine Vinegar | 1/4 cup |
| Thyme, fresh | 2 sprigs |
| Feta Cheese | as needed |
Instructions:
- Preheat your oven to 425F. Put your beef in a large bowl, add the red wine vinegar, salt, pepper, and garlic powder. Let this marinate for an hour or overnight.
- Take your diced sweet potatoes, put them on a sheet pan and drizzle a little bit of oil, salt, pepper and the cinnamon. Toss with your hands to get seasoning and oil on all of the potatoes. Bake until the potatoes have some color, you will have to flip them after 10-15 minutes, the total cooking time should be about 30-35 minutes
- When you are finished marinating your beef, get your instapot and set it to sear. Add oil and sear all of the meat on all sides, do batches if it cannot fit it one go. Then after all the meat is seared, set the instapot to braise. Add all of the meat back in, the beef stock, thyme, and half of the pickled onions. Cover the instapot and it let it turn your meat into fork tender greatness. If you do not have an instapot, you can sear the meat in a regular large pot. After all the meat is seared, add it back in and put the pot on medium low heat with the rest of the ingredients to braise.
- While the meat is braising, take your potatoes out when they are done and let them cool a bit. After cooled put them in a blender with the coconut oil and blend. If it is too thick to blend, add a little bit of water to thin it out some.
- When the meat is done you can reheat the the puree on the stove on medium-low heat (so you don’t scorch it) while stirring
- Assemble: Plate the hot puree in the center of the plate, pile up some of the braised beef in center of that, spoon some of the beef jus (the leftover liquid in the pot) around the puree, sprinkle on the feta cheese and put some pickled onions on there and you are done! you have a beautiful plate bursting with texture, flavor, and subtle sweetness from the cinnamon and sweet potato.
Tips:
- If you marinate the beef overnight, you can also roast the potatoes the day before and refrigerate them, then puree them the same day you cook the beef.
- If you plan ahead on this dish, try making your own pickled onions instead of buying them. I currently don’t have my recipe for my pickled onions but once I do, I will add a link here.
Brainstorm:
So I actually have brainstormed on this dish because I wanted to try making this with waxy potatoes instead of sweet potatoes and it came out great. I used the same mashed potato recipe that is in my salmon recipe. So instead I had a creamy cheesy mashed potatoes under my fork tender beef, it was a perfect combination. I will also have a recipe for that uploaded eventually too. Below I have a peek of the beef dish I am talking about, enjoy.
Thank you all for reading, I hope you enjoyed. Please share this with your family and friends and look forward to my next food blog!
www.brainstormkitchen.com 