Steak with salad and potatoes

Michael Craig

With our schedules quickly filling, time is of the essence and we want to share with you some tasty and delicious recipes that won't have you spending hours in the kitchen. At our house, a quick go-to meal is always steak with potatoes and salad but with a few special touches these dishes go from ordinary to extraordinary thanks to a few sneaky anchovies and some dabs of butter here and there.

Anchovies don't have the best name among some people but if used correctly they bring a rich saltiness to a dish that is unrivalled. Paired with a delicious grilled scotch fillet, our anchovy and caper sauce with fresh herbs is just the ticket for a quick and easy Sunday dinner paired with some to-die-for fondant potatoes and, of course, an easy spinach salad. You will have the whole family or yourself calling you a kitchen hero.

Anchovy and caper sauce

1 clove	Garlic
5	Anchovies
1 cup	Flat leaf (Italian) parsley, roughly chopped
¼ cup	Capers
1	Lemon, juice of
½	Lemons, zest of
¼ cup	Olive oil

Fondant potatoes and scotch fillet

4	Potatoes, large (Main)
2 Tbsp	Vegetable oil
30 g	Butter
2 cloves	Garlic, skin on
3 sprigs	Fresh thyme
1 cup	Chicken stock
4 pieces	Scotch fillets (Main)
2 Tbsp	Vegetable oil

Spinach and parsley salad and dressing

1 bag	Spinach leaves
1 cup	Flat leaf (Italian) parsley, Italian, leaves only
¼ cup	Feta, crumbled
¼	Red onions, finely sliced
¼ cup	Almonds, shaved
2 tsp	Wholegrain mustard
3 tsp	Brown sugar
3 Tbsp	Red wine vinegar
¼ cup	Olive oil

Directions

Anchovy and caper sauce

1. Pound the anchovies and garlic using a mortar and pestle, until smooth.
2. Add the capers and lightly pound into the sauce, leaving some whole.
3. Add the parsley and stir together.
4. Stir in the lemon juice and zest, oil and freshly ground pepper and serve.

Fondant potatoes

1. Preheat oven to 200C. Cut potatoes lengthwise so they are 5cm-thick. Cut with a 5cm ring cutter.
2. Place potatoes into a bowl of cold water for about 5 minutes to remove starch from outsides. Pat dry with paper towels.
3. Place a heavy oven-proof skillet (such as a cast iron skillet) over high heat. Pour in vegetable oil and once oil starts to shimmer add potatoes, garlic cloves and thyme.
4. Cook potatoes on each side for 5 minutes or until golden brown. Season.
5. Add butter to pan and cook until butter foams and foam turns from white to a pale tan colour. Season with more salt and pepper. Pour chicken stock into skillet, until it comes halfway up the potatoes.
6. Place skillet in oven for about 30 minutes or until a knife slides easily into the potatoes, add more stock and cook for a further 10 minutes if they are not completely tender. Remove from oven and serve with steak.

Scotch fillet

1. Heat a heavy-based skillet until it is smoking hot.
2. Season the steak generously with salt and pepper.
3. Place oil in pan until it starts to shimmer then carefully place two steaks at a time in the pan.
4. Cook for two and a half minutes on each side (this depends on the size of the steaks). Remove from the pan and leave to rest for 5 minutes.

Spinach and parsley salad

1. Toast the shaved almonds in a fry pan until just golden.
2. Toss all of the salad ingredients in a bowl.
3. To make the dressing, whisk together the mustard, brown sugar and red wine vinegar then slowly drizzle the oil in and whisk to combine.
4. Dress the salad with the dressing just before serving.