Beef
869 recipes found
Rao's Meatballs With Marinara Sauce
This is one of the signature dishes at Rao’s, the East Harlem red-sauce joint that is best-known for a loyal, boldface-name clientele that makes it difficult to get a table. The restaurant now has satellites in Las Vegas and Los Angeles.
Calabrian Meatballs
Featured in my cookbook, “Heirloom Kitchen: Heritage Recipes and Family Stories from the Tables of Immigrant Women” (Harper Design, 2019), this polpette recipe comes from my grandmother’s Calabrian kitchen. The sugo di pomodoro, or tomato sauce, delivers complex flavor, serving as the poaching liquid for the delicate meatballs and as an essential ingredient in the meatballs themselves, adding both flavor and juiciness. Lightened further with milk and Italian bread crumbs, the meatballs are incredibly tender, bursting at the touch of your fork. The recipe yields a crowd-serving portion, perfect for Sunday dinner, but also freezes beautifully. Though the sauce may be tossed with your favorite pasta, this dish is the ideal version of a traditional platter of meatballs, covered in sauce and garnished with cheese and basil.
Beef Bourguignon
Like coq au vin, its sister dish from the Burgundy region of France, beef Bourguignon is a stew of meat slowly simmered in hearty red wine along with pearl onions, mushrooms and crisp, cubed bacon. Use a good wine here, something simple but drinkable. It makes all the difference in the finished dish. As with all beef stews, this one is best made a day or two ahead; don’t sauté the mushrooms and onions until just before serving. This recipe is part of The New Essentials of French Cooking, a guide to definitive dishes every modern cook should master.
Pasta With Meatballs
Carbohydrate avoidance be damned: pasta with meatballs is the perfect culinary counter to the cruel world. Just looking at a slippery, tomato-sauced tangle of spaghetti topped with juicy toothsome meatballs makes you feel better; eating it is the instant antidote to whatever ails you. The recipe here makes more sauce, perhaps, than you'd normally want to use to dress a pound of pasta, but when I sit down to eat with the children I want to make sure I'm not going to have to get up and make them anything else to eat before they go to bed. (Of course you can freeze a portion of little meatballs in sauce for easy access in meals ahead. They need not accompany a bowl of pasta. My children like them just as much with a mound of plain white rice. Who wouldn't?)
Kalleh Gonjeshki (Meatballs and Potatoes)
Kalleh gonjeshki is a comforting and nostalgic Iranian dish that, at its core, is a simple preparation of meatballs and potatoes simmered in a tomatoey sauce. Kalleh gonjeshki means “sparrow’s head” in Persian, and the name is a reference to the size of the meatballs. Every family has its own version of this childhood favorite, and the dish hits the spot on cooler evenings. Don’t replace the dried mint in the meatball mixture with fresh mint, as the dried mint contributes earthier notes and provides more flavor and fragrance. To cut down on time and pans, the meatballs are first baked in the oven, but you can also pan-fry them on the stovetop if you like. Kalleh gonjsheki is served with a side of bread, but you can also serve it alongside rice.
Liberian Peanut Soup
This Liberian peanut soup, recipe courtesy of Helene Cooper, should satisfy peanut butter lovers, as well as anyone who wants a thick, rich, meaty dish.
Sancocho
Sancocho, a word often used as slang by Puerto Ricans to mean a big old mix of things, is a rustic stew eaten across the Caribbean and made with every imaginable combination of proteins and vegetables. My father cooked his with beef, corn and noodles; my mom with chicken breasts, lean pork and sweet plantains; my grandmother with beef, pork on the bone and yautia. As such, I’ve rarely used a recipe, so this one is based largely on observation, taste memory and what I like. Pretty much every ingredient can be swapped out, and it also makes for a sumptuous vegetarian dish without meat. Sancocho epitomizes the resilience of Puerto Rican people, as it is often prepared in times of crisis — such as after a hurricane — and made with whatever you have on hand.
Yorkshire Pudding
This recipe is from the British-born chef April Bloomfield, who says it dates back to an era when an English pub might cook a hunk of meat by dangling it from a hook above a roaring fire. The “pudding” emerged from a pan full of runny batter that would have been placed beneath the meat to soak up the juices. “The heat of the fire would make the Yorkshire pudding rise up, and all the fat would seep in,” she said. (Life back then was “nasty, brutish, and short,” as Thomas Hobbes once griped, but apparently there were upsides.) Of course, making Yorkshire pudding these days is a more domesticated undertaking. “Now what happens is you kind of recreate that,” said Ms. Bloomfield, who serves it as part of an order-ahead prime-rib feast at the Breslin Bar & Dining Room in the Ace Hotel in Manhattan. “It’s very soulful,” she said. “Give me 10 Yorkshire puddings and a thin sliver of beef, and I’ll be very happy.”
Flank Steak With Zucchini
Marinate the meat at leisure, allow enough time to salt the zucchini to extract excess moisture and you are ready for speed-dial cooking. Once cooked, the dish can also bide its time, to anchor a summer buffet at room temperature.
Braised Beef With Eggplant
The food of Provence usually evokes summer, with lovely vegetables, salads, seafood and a whiff of lavender. But there’s a wintry side to it as well. When a fierce mistral wind blows, it’s time to crank out beef stews and roasted meats. This braised beef dish, a pot roast, keeps a Provençal flavor profile, with eggplant, garlic, fennel, rosemary, orange, black olives and tomatoes. It’s prepared to allow the eggplant to maintain its character and not disintegrate. I like to braise a nice piece of tri-tip sirloin, but this recipe will suit any cut of beef you prefer for braising. Serve the dish with plain broad egg noodles dressed with a splash of good olive oil.
Steak-and-Kidney Pudding
Pastel de Choclo (Beef and Corn Casserole)
Pastel de choclo is found in many different forms throughout South America — cake made with corn, baked corn pudding or a layered casserole. This recipe is inspired by the Chilean version, a beef-and-corn casserole, which consists of pino, a flavorful beef mixture often studded with black olives, raisins and hard-boiled eggs, topped with corn pudding. It’s reminiscent of shepherd’s pie, but with rich corn pudding in place of mashed potatoes. In this interpretation, the pudding is slightly sweet and cheesy, the way my mom Silvia used to make it. It also swaps out black olives for meatier Castelvetrano olives, and frozen corn can be used when fresh is out of season. The pudding is mixed entirely in the blender and can be baked on its own as a rich, cheesy side dish in a well-greased cast-iron pan at 350 degrees for 45 minutes.
Beef and Broccoli
Here is a streamlined, powerfully flavorful recipe for a delivery-food standby: velvety wok-fried beef in a oyster-soy sauce, served in a forest of green. ‘‘It’s diaspora food,’’ the chef Jonathan Wu told me, describing the cooking of Chinese immigrants to the United States and a dish that is almost unknown in China but beloved in America. The recipe is a version of the one Wu’s mother made for dinner when he was growing up outside Hartford, Conn., with a little chile-garlic paste added for zip and, thanks to the Brooklyn chef Dale Talde, a pat of butter swirled into the sauce at the end. This provides a plush gloss that is far better than the traditional cornstarch slurry. It is midweek family cooking at its best.
One-Pan Pork Chops With Feta, Snap Peas and Mint
Brawny and golden brown, these seared pork chops make a hearty one-pan dinner that’s rounded out by sweet sugar snap peas and loads of fresh mint. The feta, added at the end, melts into the pork and peas, spiking the sauce with its brininess. Be generous with the fresh lemon juice at the end; this rich dish gains a lot from the tang.
Goulash and Spatzle
Extra Special Meat Loaf
Twice-Cooked Pork Tenderloin
Here's a surprising and flavorful way to prepare tenderloin, one of the leanest and most economical cuts of pork. Brown the whole tenderloin. Let it rest for a few minutes, so the meat firms up a bit. Then slice the tenderloin into medallions, about an inch thick. Brown the slices on both sides and top with a quick French-style sauce made of heavy cream and Dijon mustard, lemon juice or Calvados.
Oven-Braised Guinness Beef Stew With Horseradish Cream
Classic beef stew is good, but this sophisticated beef stew — enriched with beer, cocoa powder and espresso — is really something special. Start by browning the beef and making a quick roux to guarantee a thick, flavorful stew instead of a watery, bland soup, and finish with hit of balsamic vinegar and lemon juice to balance out the rich, round notes. Dried shiitake mushrooms provide another layer of complexity, but if you can’t find them, leave them out. The stew will still be delicious. Top big bowls of it with swirls of tangy horseradish cream. (Here are slow cooker and pressure cooker versions of the recipe.)
Pork Tenderloin With Shallots and Prunes
Porc aux pruneaux, which is a classic, is by no means fancy, and it is always much more old-fashioned bistro or grandmotherly than high end. Simply put, it is a pork roast with red-wine-soused prunes. Hardly elegant, although it doesn’t have to be heavy either. In France, countless versions of the dish are made in neighborhood joints and at home. Sometimes a large loin or shoulder roast is used, sometimes pan-fried chops. Here we use a lightly brined pork tenderloin, adding stewed shallots to the sauce for depth and texture, and a touch of ginger for brightness. While the roast is in the oven, the shallots simmer with the wine and prunes for the sauce. The dark red sauce (rather unctuous really) is both sweet and tart, with a boozy hint of Madeira. It strikes a Middle European chord somewhere deep within. Serve with sweet potatoes or garnet yams roasted in their skins.
Hamburgers (Tavern Style)
Here is a hamburger you might find in taverns and bars, plump and juicy, with a thick char that gives way to tender, medium-rare meat. It is best cooked in a heavy, cast-iron skillet slicked with oil or fat. Ask a butcher for coarse-ground chuck steak, with at least a 20 percent fat content, or grind your own. Keep it in the refrigerator until you are ready to cook, and then when you do, form your patties gently. Season after the meat is in the pan.
Balkan Burgers
Called pljeskavica, pronounced PLYESS-ka-vee-tsa, this burger as wide as a birthday cake is beloved in Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slovenia and Montenegro; and more recently in Italy, Germany, Chicago as well as Queens.
The Comme Ça Burger
Michael David, the executive chef at Comme Ça brasserie in Los Angeles, gave this recipe to The Times in 2009 — a consummate burger that took him, he said, 11 tries to develop. The patties are seared on a plancha, stove-top cast-iron skillet, or grill, then finished either in the oven or the cooler side of a grill, with melted Cheddar and, at last, an iceberg lettuce salad dressed with spicy mayonnaise on top. With a toasted bun, it’s a ridiculously fine thing to eat.
Zuni Café’s Hamburger
Made to exacting standards, the hamburger at Zuni Café, in San Francisco, is legendary. First, grass-fed beef is salted well in advance of grinding, which gives the meat its succulence. Grilled over coals and flipped three times to prevent it from overcharring or becoming tough, the patty is rested, like a roast. It is then served on a toasted square of rosemary focaccia, smeared with handmade aioli and accompanied by Zuni’s acclaimed house pickles: fuchsia-red onion rings and turmeric-tinged sliced zucchini. It is wonderful on its own, but toppings like Shelburne Farms Cheddar, Bayley Hazen blue cheese, grilled onions or portobello mushroom are also available, and most customers can’t resist a heaping plate of shoestring potatoes alongside. It’s perfectly possible to make these burgers at home, but know that the full project involves several recipes, so it’s probably best to spread the work out over a few days.
Carne Adobada (Chile-Marinated Steak)
Mexican adobada, a tangy marinade with guajillo chiles, is often reserved for large cuts of pork, but it’s also well-suited to any sturdy cut of steak, such as flank. The acid comes from lime juice in this formula, but vinegar or lemon juice works as well. An overnight marinade yields incredibly tender results, but a 30-minute steep is sufficient to infuse the meat with the fruity flavor of the chiles. Here, the steak is paired with a nice piquant roasted red pepper relish, which complements the deep flavors of the marinated meat. Side dishes like rice, beans and warm tortillas round this dish out for a wonderful weeknight meal.