The Minimalist Cooks Dinner (26 page)

TIME:
1 hour or more, largely unattended

MAKES:
4 servings

Most kimchee, Korea’s famous cabbage pickle, takes a while to make. But it’s easy enough to take the basic ingredients and flavors of kimchee and create a fast cabbage salad that puts ordinary coleslaw to shame. Use this as a flavorful bed for simply grilled beef, or anything else that has the flavor to stand up to the spicy slaw, and you have a great summer dish. Cook the meat in a skillet or under the broiler if the weather is cold.

• 1 small head Napa or Savoy cabbage (about 1½ pounds)
  

• Coarse salt
  

• 3 spring onions or 6 large scallions, trimmed and chopped
  

• 3 garlic cloves or to taste, minced
  

• 1 tablespoon
  co chu karo
  chile powder (see Keys to Success) or crushed red pepper flakes, or to taste
  

• 1 tablespoon minced ginger
  

• 3 tablespoons fish sauce or soy sauce
  

• 2 tablespoons rice wine or other vinegar
  

• About 1½ pounds flank steak
  

• Freshly ground black pepper
  

1. Remove the tough exterior leaves of the cabbage and core it by cutting a cone-shaped wedge out of the stem end. Shred it by cutting thin slices and separating them with your hands. Put in a colander and toss with about 1 tablespoon salt and the onions. Let sit for at least 1 hour, preferably 2, tossing occasionally, until the cabbage wilts.
   

2. Meanwhile, start a medium-hot charcoal or wood fire or preheat a gas grill to the maximum. Set the rack 2-4 inches from the heat source. For the dressing, combine the garlic, chile powder, ginger, fish sauce, and vinegar in a bowl. Grill the steak for about 4 minutes per side for medium-rare, turning once, longer or shorter according to the degree of doneness you prefer. Sprinkle the steak with salt and pepper as it cooks.
   

3. Remove the steak from the grill and let it rest while you squeeze as much liquid as you can out of the cabbage and toss it with the dressing. To serve, carve the steak. Place a portion of cabbage on a plate and top with a few slices of steak. Spoon a little of the dressing over the steak and serve.
   

TIME:
45 minutes, longer if you have the time

MAKES:
4 servings

For
bulgogi
, a Korean beef dish sometimes made with short ribs, the meat is stripped off the bone, marinated in a soy-based sauce, and then grilled at the table; the hot meat is then wrapped in cool lettuce and eaten with the hands. I had thought the dish was impossible to attempt without an in-table-grill. I finally realized, however, that the time the meat spends over the coals—certainly less than 5 minutes—might be long enough to add the mental image of wood flavor, but certainly not the reality. So, with what might be described as typical American arrogance, I set about reinventing this traditional Korean dish, and I’m happy about the results.

• 3 to 4 pounds short ribs
  

• ½ cup roughly chopped trimmed scallions, shallots, or onion
  

• 1 tablespoon roughly chopped ginger
  

• 6 garlic cloves, roughly chopped
  

• 1 tablespoon sugar
  

• ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
  

• ½ cup soy sauce
  

• 16 to 24 romaine or other lettuce leaves, washed and dried
  

• Soy sauce or ground bean paste (available at Asian markets), optional
  

1. If time allows, freeze the meat for 30 minutes or so to facilitate slicing. Use a sharp knife to strip the meat from the ribs—it will come off easily and in one piece (reserve the bones and any meat that adheres to them for stock).
   

2. Combine the scallions, ginger, garlic, sugar, pepper, soy sauce, and ½ cup water in a blender and purée until very smooth. Slice the meat into pieces between
   J
   and ¼ inch in thickness. Toss with the marinade and let sit from 15 minutes to 2 hours. Preheat a grill, broiler with the grill rack set 2 to 4 inches from the heat source. Or preheat a stovetop grill, or preheat the oven to its maximum heat and put a heavy roasting pan in it (see Keys to Success).
   

3. Remove the meat from the marinade and grill, pan-grill, broil, or roast it, just until done, no more than a couple of minutes per side; it’s nice if the meat is browned on the outside and rare on the inside, but it’s imperative
   that it not be overcooked. Serve with the lettuce leaves. To eat, wrap a piece or two of meat in a torn piece of lettuce; garnish with a drop or two of soy sauce or bean paste, if you like.
   

We have my friend Steve Johnson (chef at the Blue Room in Cambridge, Massachusetts) to thank for this particular combination of skirt steak and compound butter. But you can hardly go wrong with skirt steak, a long, thin band of wonderfully marbled muscle (actually the cow’s diaphragm), or with the flavored butter that complements it. Until butter became forbidden food it was a common treatment as a quick flavor booster, even plain. In classic cooking, compound butters were kept on hand and often used to enhance rich sauces. But more recently they’ve stood on their own, as quick, simple toppings, not only for steak, but for leaner meats, like veal, chicken, and even fish.

TIME:
30 to 40 minutes

MAKES:
4 servings

• ½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened slightly
  

• ¼ teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
  

• 10 chives, minced
  

• 1 shallot, minced
  

• Salt and freshly ground black pepper
  

• ½ teaspoon red wine vinegar or fresh lemon juice
  

• About 24 ounces skirt steak, cut into 4 portions
  

1. Prepare a gas or charcoal grill: The fire should be so hot, you can hold your hand over it for only a couple of seconds. (You can broil or pan-grill the steak, if you prefer.) Meanwhile, cream the butter with a fork, then add and integrate the thyme, chives, shallot, about ½ teaspoon each of salt and pepper, and the vinegar. Taste and add more of any ingredient you deem necessary.
   

2. When the fire is ready grill the steak, 2 minutes per side for rare, 1 to 2 minutes longer for medium-rare to medium. Season the steak as it cooks with salt and pepper.
   

3. Spread each steak with about a tablespoon of the flavored butter and serve. Wrap and refrigerate or freeze the remaining butter for future use.