Steak Sauce

Steak Sauce

This is a sauce that I have come up with after experimenting with various hypotheses of the famous ‘le Relais de Venise’ sauce that abound on the Internet.

Don’t balk at the idea of using chicken livers– I personally hate eating liver, but in this sauce it adds a certain ‘je ne sais quoi’ and turns an ordinary French herb sauce into something quite exceptional.

Ingredients (enough for 4 portions)

1 teaspoon clarified butter

40g chicken liver

1 large clove garlic, crushed

A sprig of fresh thyme

Fresh rosemary – finely chopped - half a tablespoon

Fresh tarragon – finely chopped - half a tablespoon

Fresh thyme - finely chopped - half a tablespoon

Fresh oregano – finely chopped - half a tablespoon

1 teaspoon paprika

1 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper

1/8 teaspoon of salt

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

200mls double cream
1 tablespoon brandy

50g unsalted butter – cut into small pieces and kept in the fridge until needed.

Method

1. Heat the clarified butter in a small frying pan and add the chicken liver, crushed garlic and sprig of thyme - cook for 3 - 4 minutes.

2. Add all the finely chopped herbs, paprika, salt, pepper, mustard, brandy and cooked liver to the cream in a saucepan and warm it up over a low heat for about 5 minutes.

3. Pass the cream mixture through a fine sieve and put the sieved sauce back into the saucepan.

4. When you are ready to serve the sauce, heat it gently over a low heat, stir the butter in, spoon the sauce over the cooked steaks and serve immediately.

Additional Information

One of the many invaluable lessons that I learnt at a French cooking school was that you don’t need to marinate a steak before cooking it, nor do you need to ‘rest it’ before serving. I did an experiment where I cooked two steaks and rested one of them – the taste of the rested and unrested steaks were the same, but the rested one was significantly colder and consequently wasn’t as enjoyable as the unrested steak!

Another important tip is to use warm plates when serving food – I know it’s an obvious thing to do, but it does make a huge difference, as the food stays hot for much longer.