70. Shallot-Butter Pan Sauce

Date Cooked: February 14, 2009
Page: 391
Rating: B

Really quick confession. The picture is not of the product served and does not reflect the rating I gave. The above picture was of attempt one. This was a pan sauce I made for pan-seared steaks and it didn’t go as expected.

Once the steaks were done I had to cook the shallots in the same pan. Well things were hectic on this day and the pan was a little hot (it was used for searing steaks) and the recipe indicated to remove it from the heat and then cook the shallots over low heat. Well let’s just say it’s possible that I may not have turned the heat to low and immediately upon removing the steaks dumped in the shallots. They crisped up in less than 30 seconds, the pan was still a little warm. I proceeded anyway and threw in the butter which browned up nice and quick followed by lemon juice and parsley. Yes, there is fresh parsley in that sauce. You don’t have to taste it to know it was garbage.

Well I had spent a fair dollar on these steaks and I was not going to ruin them with the burnt trash I had created so I quickly minced a few more shallots and proceeded to create the pan sauce again at a lower temperature. The only problem with round two is that I didn’t have any of the browned bits left in the pan from searing the steaks. But considering the alternatives of incinerator residue or no sauce I felt this second attempt wasn’t too bad at all.

Rating: Depends on if I rate round one or two. F or B. The sauce was a nice accompaniment to the steaks but since I am a person that always orders a steak with a strong sauce (peppercorn, blue-cheese peppercorn, etc.) it was a little mild for me.

** You'll see the finished sauce in the next post