Mini steak with curry leaves

This is so yummy and a quick, easy dish to fry up. It’s exquisite morsels of steak that is deliciously marinated and singed on all sides.

My secret ingredient–and I dare say few people here would have tried it– is curry leaves. I toss the curry leaves in with some chopped garlic a few minutes before the beef is pan-fried to perfection.

The question is what is curry leaves? It’s not where powdered curry comes from. Look for it in Indian, Cambodian and Thai grocery stores. I get mine fresh from a Korean supermarket. It is also sold dried. The flavor is worth the search. Store the compound leaves in the freezer. For more on curry leaves, click here.

You will need a good steak. No need to invest in fillet mignon, I usually select a thick slice of rib-eye. Select one that is thick and well marbled. I cut the steak into square chunks. I’m not serving steak the regular way–one slab per person. This is a dish I offer together with my other Asian dishes, eaten family style.

It doesn’t matter how big the cubes are. If you have a thinner steak, the cubes would just be smaller. Smaller cubes–even half-inch cubes–are just as delicious. You can also cut steak into rectangular chunks. To cut the cubes, I just slice the steak crosswise into strips , turn the knife 90 degrees and cut steak into cubes.

These small pieces will allow the marinade to be well coated on all sides. Cooking the chunks will be much faster than cooking a whole slab of meat. You can singe it quickly on all sides.

My favorite go-to marinade is what my Filipino cook Dora Sanda taught me. Smash and chop garlic and add oil. Let garlic bloom in oil for a couple of minutes. (Smell it, it’s heavenly.) Then add soy sauce and a little sugar. Add ground pepper if you wish. It looks like this and is just perfect for any meat or chicken.

Yikes, I just looked carefully at my photo and the garlic is not perfectly chopped. Everything still tasted good. Toss the meat in and leave to marinade for 10 minutes or up to 20-30 minutes. Recipe continues below.

I make this dish when I feel like having a good chunk of beef but not so much to eat a whole rib eye steak by myself. This recipe works very well if you are too lazy to fire up the grill, or mess around with a cast-iron pan. I just use a regular non-stick pan. It’s wonderful to serve with to a group when you have a host of other dishes. Pan fried, it takes no longer than 10 minutes to cook. To dress it up, you can plate it over a bed of lettuce.

You can also serve this as an entree with jasmine rice (or quinoa) and a side dish of vegetables. As a main dish, you can make dinner in less than 30 minutes.

Pan-fried Steak Morsels With Curry Leaves

Preparation time: 5-10 minutes
Cooking time: 8-10 minutes

1 pound beef ribeye, cut into cubes
2 tablespoons oil
2 stalks curry leaves, stalks removed, rinsed and dried thoroughly
3 or 4 cloves garlic, finely chopped

Marinade
2 cloves garlic, crushed and chopped finely
1 tablespoon oil
1½ tablespoons soy sauce
½ teaspoon sugar
1/8 teaspoon black pepper
½ teaspoon cornstarch (optional)

Pat steaks with paper kitchen towel to dry. Cubes should be no bigger than 1½ inches wide. It’s tastier if it is smaller. If you have very tender beef and prefer steak rare, cut them larger.

In a bowl, blend garlic with oil and let it seep for a few seconds. Then add soy sauce, sugar, pepper and cornstarch. Pour over beef, mix well and marinate for at least 10 minutes.

Heat a non-stick pan on high heat, then add oil. Turn pan to coat with the oil. When oil is shimmering, add pieces of beef carefully so as not to splatter oil on yourself.

Place beef in one layer. Don’t crowd the pan. Let beef sizzle. When the edges of the meat touching the pan start to brown, about 2-4 minutes, turn over with tongs or chopsticks to brown other sides.

Let beef singe for another 2-3 minutes. Add the garlic and curry leaves over meat. Allow beef to brown for 1-2 minutes or so. Lower heat to medium to prevent garlic from burning. Then shake the pan so the leaves fall through spaces into the grease.

 

Cook another minute or so. Use a spatula to quickly toss beef and curry leaves to mix well.

Don’t overcook the beef. You may test if beef is done by slicing one cube to see if it is cooked the way you like it. Or you may use a thermometer. (See below for temperatures.) Transfer to a serving dish and serve immediately.

NOTES
–Depending on how you like beef done, this should take 5- 6 minutes only. It’s best to turn each cube of beef individually so all the sides are browned. This is like pan-frying mini-steaks.

–Is you use a thermometer to check if meat is done, it’s 125 degrees F for rare, and 130-135 degrees F for medium-rare.

WHAT GETS TRICKY: Don’t dump all the beef–together with marinade–into frying pan at one go. The liquid will cool the pan down too much. I prefer to transfer each piece, one at a time, and place it in the oil.

If the meat looks a little steamy when being fried, shake the pan and blow at it to dry it out. I know it sounds silly but, hey, it dries out the steam! (I do it with mushrooms as well.) I was excited to see a top chef do the same on TV.

Variations
Different ingredients:
–For garlic lovers: add 1 extra tablespoon garlic to the hot oil between the pieces of steak just before you turn the pieces around. Yum!

Banquet Presentation
–Serve this over lettuce leaves.