To sauce or not sauce...

Sauce and steak it's a touchy subject for some people. If you ask my husband - "sauce ruins the flavor of meat". Me, I grew up eating A-1 or BBQ sauce or even dipped it in ranch at one time of my childhood. I've always liked my meat cooked well done. Apparently that's another no no and that's why I had to have sauce with it. Now a days I enjoy a good steak cooked medium-rare to medium, depending on who's cooking it. My mom likes hers mooing rare. I've grown to understand the flavor does change the longer you cook it. I've always had trouble with writing recipes that grill items. So may factors such as the type of pit you cook on and the heat and the flames, the thickness of the meat and so on. Grilling is one thing that everyone has their own personal touch. So for this post you're own your own for grilling your meat it's just about the sauce. :)

The inspiration for this dish came from a steak I had at Smith & Wollensky Steakhouse. I thought I would try the Filet Mignon Oscar Style and I must say it changed my life forever. It melted in my mouth and I savored every bite. I think I even stabbed my husbands hand when he tried to grab a piece. I've had it a couple of times after that and it was never the same. I searched online and found a few recipes that all pretty much were the same with a couple of things different so I mixed and matched and went with my own version. Besides the fact that my looks like it crudled (which it didn't it's the canned crab meat instead of jumbo lump crab meat), and the sauce not being a creamier white sauce it was just ok for me. Some things you can't just duplicate so I'm not giving up I will try a couple variations to it. On the positive side I give myself a gold start for making my first Hollandaise Sauce from scratch. Hollandaise is the base of this sauce which turned into a bearnaise by adding the wine and herbs.

Filet of Beef Oscar Style

3 large egg yolks

1 tablespoon lemon juice

1 tablespoon white wine

1/2 cup firm stick butter (do not use margarine)

1 tablespoon chopped onion

1/2 teaspoon dried tarragon

1 can crab claw meat, drained

Stir egg yolks, lemon juice and white wine vigorously in 1 1/2 quart saucepan. Add 1/4 cup of the butter. Heat over very low heat, stirring constantly with wire whisk, until butter is melted. Add remaining butter.

Continue stirring until melted and sauce is thickened. Stir remaining ingredients in and stir until heated through.

My husband gets a kick how I like to play with my food and plate it to make it look pretty. We may not be a the restaurant, but who says you can't make it look fancy? To make the asparagus look evenly spaced I altered the direction they were facing on ever other one and then placed the steak on top.

I spooned the sauce over the asparagus instead of chopping the asparagus up in it. (I figured it was easier to scoot the sauce off if it turned out bad then waste the asparagus.)

Overall the meat was cooked perfect the way I like it and it was pretty tasty even if the sauce had a funky texture!