Put together this quick and delicious meal at short notice for a guest. Annoyingly by the time I went out to get the steaks my local butcher was shut and the butcher at Selfridges said the delivery van had broken down on the motorway so due to “health and safety” all the meat was condemned and will be turned into dog food.

Somebody’s dog is going to eat wagyu it’s so unfair.

I asked if I could have the exact GPS coordinates of the abandoned van full of expensive meat but for some reason he wouldn’t give them to me.

Anyway… M&S it is. I felt very patronised by their strategy of making the steaks extra thin and tiny and thinking you won’t realise. The sirloin was extremely small barely a centimeter deep and just 200 grams. Can be really hard to cook a steak that thin but anyway I put the pan super hot, seared it, finished in the pan with a little butter then cut and salted at the table. I had a fillet steak because I’m allegedly watching what I eat (although the 9 course tasting menu at The Connaught the night before suggests otherwise. That was so good!). To have with the steaks I made a sort of gratin thingy, very losely based on the the French classic “Boulangere” potatoes, where I cooked potatoes, fennel (I’m obsessed with fennel), red onion and broccoli stalks in the oven in a little stock and butter, then finished with St Helena, which is a British cheese similar to a Brie. Although I prefer French cheeses to British, I’ve decided I might as well slowly start weaning myself onto British cheeses as soon that might be the only stuff available 🤣! Although I made this recipe up as I went along I knew it would work and it went down a treat with steaks. Served with nothing but a blob of kernel mustard from Quality Chop House in Clerkenwell, which is one of my favourite simple restaurants that has a lovely shop selling mostly meat and deli items (all British, like I said… I’m trying my best, plus we do actually have some fantastic producers here.)

Of course not a bite of food was left, always a nice feeling to have my food appreciated!

B xxx