I am doing a really cool twist on steak night.
I cut the eggplant, two small to medium eggplant,
enough to fill a sheet tray.
One large sheet tray with a piece of parchment,
just enough to fill the pan.
Sprinkle salt and pepper, throw it in the oven.
Oven is 425 with rack at center.
Cover the eggplant with the non-aerosol EVOO.
Flip it after about 10 minutes.
You want it to be nice and golden
and just barely tender.
Evenly tender all over.
Boom, gone.
Now, we're gonna make the dressing.
Notice.
Not doing much with the steaks yet.
Why, we're taking the chill off.
My rules for meat, take the chill off,
get the pan hot,
season liberally,
and let it rest when it gets in the pan.
Don't force it around too much.
Don't bully it in the pan.
And let it rest
when it comes out of the pan before you slice it.
Those are the rules.
So I'm pre-heating the cast iron skillet
which I very lightly sprayed,
also with a little bit of olive oil.
Now we're gonna make the dressing.
Again, you can buy dry seasoning,
mix it with lemon juice and olive oil,
or you can buy dressing that contains za'atar.
If you are making your own,
three tablespoons or so, I don't measure it,
I just look at it, of toasted sesame.
Two tablespoons or so of sumac.
Two teaspoons each of everything else.
Oregano.
Crushed red pepper or ground red pepper.
Coriander.
Cumin.
Garlic.
Onion.
Cilantro.
Or parsley if you don't care for cilantro
and dried dill..
Juice of one lemon.
Two that you're gonna add a third of a cup or so
of good, fancy, fruity EVOO.
That's resting and it's gonna go over
eggplant that's in the oven
and some sliced steak.
This is (speaks foreign language)
AKA, French for flank steak.
I seasoned the top side over the break and just flipped it
so now we're gonna season this side
and as Mark Murphy would say, "Season with authority!"
Season from above so you get even distribution,
little over the shoulder for luck on the salt.
Salt and pepper.
To go along with this, not only eggplant,
but we're gonna broil tomatoes.
So I trimmed the tops,
then I drizzled all of them
with just olive oil and salt and pepper.
When the eggplant comes out, switch the broiler on
and broil these like five minutes.
You're just charring the top.
I'm gonna give it a little light spray
of canola or high-temperature cooking oil,
non-aerosol, of course,
and we're going to put the steaks in
and do not mess with them!
Now, what I was gonna tell you
about these steaks also is
if you are like my sister and you prefer meat
medium well to well done, this is not the cut for you.
You know what a nice choice might be?
Skirt.
Skirt steak is paper thin, it's the diaphragm.
It's fatty.
You cook it pretty much well done
and it's still gonna taste good.
That's a great choice, not too bad.
So we're going to start
with a little bit of wild arugula
and we're going to layer this
on top of the arugula
and then over everybody, we get some charred lemon
that I put cut-side down in the pan
while the steak was still cooking,
here we go, over John's portion here.
Now, some batons of eggplant,
broiled tomato.
Here goes the za'atar dressing.
How gorgeous is that?
(glittery music)