Looking for
great food gifts?

Find something
special in our
Food Gifts Store

• 1-1/2 pounds flank steak (1 piece)
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 butter, softened
• 2 tablespoons scallions, thinly sliced
• 1 cup dry red wine
• 1 head of roasted garlic (see Note below)

Sprinkle flank steak with salt and a generous amount of freshly ground black pepper.

Heat a large heavy skillet. Do not add butter or other fat. When hot, cook seasoned steak until seared and well browned on each side (about 1 minute per side). Reduce heat and add 2 tablespoons of butter. Cook 3 to 5 minutes on each side. For best results, the meat should be quite rare. Remove the meat from the pan and keep warm.

Pour off any fat in the skillet, and add the scallions and red wine. Bring to a boil and whisk in the garlic purèe. Boil until the wine is reduced by half, thickened, and syrupy. As it boils, scrape up the browned bits in the skillet with a wooden spoon. Stir in the meat juices that have accumulated under the flank steak. Boil for a few seconds more. Remove from heat.

Gently swirl in the 2 tablespoons of softened butter so that it incorporates into the wine. Quickly slice the meat, against the grain, into thin strips. Arrange the slices on a hot platter, pour sauce down the center and serve at once.

---

Note: Flank steak is often used for fajitas, but this recipe makes excellent use of this fairly tough cut of meat.

Roasting Garlic: To roast garlic, put a whole, unpeeled head of garlic (that's a head of garlic -- not just one clove) in a pan or baking dish in an oven preheated to 350°F. Drizzle 2 teaspoons of olive oil over it and bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour, until it is soft. You can speed up the process by slicing a half inch or so off the top of the garlic head. "Topped" garlic heads will roast in 30 minutes. You can roast several heads at a time and refrigerate what you don't need immediately. Roasted garlic keeps well.

For the Flank Steak recipe, wait until roasted garlic head has cooled, then separate the cloves and squeeze the contents from each skin. Mash garlic with the back of a spoon to produce a rough "purée."