We buy beef by the eighth of a bullock. There's a farmer we deal with directly, not far from here, feeds their cattle on nothing but grass and produces really excellent beef. The plus side? Supporting the habitat made good by grazing, keeping a local business afloat, and getting superb quality product at a brilliant price. The down side? Well its nose to tail and a flat price for everything, and it means storing a freezer load. But thats ok, we usually get two eighths and split it among friends. Much homebrew is drunk on beef sharing night. Its almost as exciting as pig day, but involves eating fewer ears and trotters.
Anyway, because its nose to tail we get everything, including cuts I'd not normally buy. Like fillet steak - which is good (amazing from a well raised animal like this) but just not as good as many of the other cuts. Honestly, a well aged sirloin steak is tastier. It is however amazingly tender and great to cook fast.
I also had, if you remember the last recipe, a spare pan full of wild mushrooms that I'd cooked off in the oven yesterday. Now this is a handy trick - if you want to get a great texture out of mushrooms in a pasta dish like this, and if you want to really intensify the flavour, its a great idea. They were baked off in the oven for about half an hour the day before while I was cooking something else.
As for the other ingredients, there's some sliced onion, chopped parsley, garlic, and half a dozen tomatoes skinned and sliced. Oh, and a glass of wine. And, of course, the pasta. We've got a garden full of chickens so making pasta is a common thing for us - 250g of pasta flour and two eggs, and a little salt, go into the Kenwood chef bowl and get beaten to a breadcrumb texture. Thats put through the pasta attachment and hey-presto, inside of ten minutes while you're softening off your onion and garlic in a little oil, you've got pasta.
You don't have to make fresh pasta of course but, you know, why not? If you don't have an extruder like this its not especially hard to mix it by hand and use a pasta roller. But there's nothing wrong with buying pasta.
Take the onion and garlic out of the pan, put it back on the heat. and season the meat. Salt and pepper on one side, and when your pan is smoking hot put some oil in and put the meat in seasoned side down. Normally someone writing up a recipe would say how long for rare, how long for medium etc. But thats nonsense - this is thick cut fillet and you're having it rare. Look at the side of the meat when its in the pan, and when its approaching half way done at the edge season the top, flip it over and cook it just as hard on the other side. Then take it out and rest it.
While its resting, that's time to cook the pasta and make the sauce. You know how to cook a pan of pasta. For the sauce, deglaze the pan with some wine, chop the cooked mushrooms coarsely and put them in, add the tomatoes and parsley, and put the onions and garlic back in. And reduce it all down a bit. When the pasta is done, add a little butter to the sauce and that's it. The last thing to do is add the meat back in.
If you've cooked the meat right it'll look like this when you slice it up.
You want it red and juicy. Now all you have left to do is drain the pasta and mix everything thoroughly. the most common thing people in the UK do wrong with a pasta dish is they don't mix everything together at the end. Take your time, get it all, including the meat, well and truly combined with the pasta.
Dress it with a little more parsley, and thats it. I know, right, it sounds sinfully extravagant. But heck, thats one of the big advantages of being a suburban peasant. Buy direct, pick your own mushrooms, and decadent luxury is entirely affordable.
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