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Flank Steak Stuffed and Braised
Select a flank steak weighing about two and one-half pounds. Have the butcher peel off the superfluous fat and tissue and score both sides diagonally in opposite directions. Remove the steak from paper when it comes from market and lay it flat on meat board, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Spread over it a thin layer of stuffing, (see Page 154), roll lengthwise, very compactly, sew the overlapping Fifth Sunday edge securely, also the ends. Sprinkle roll with salt, pepper and dredge with flour. Place meat in pan with enough Cottolene to brown it richly, turning roll until it is richly browned all over. Then remove to Dutch oven or casserole; rinse dripping pan with a little boiling water, pour over meat and surround with two cups stewed and strained tomato pulp, one onion thinly sliced, one green pepper shredded (after removing seeds and veins), two sprays parsley, the half of a small bay leaf and two tablespoons Worcestershire sauce. Cover closely, place in oven and cook meat very slowly about three to four hours. Remove meat to serving platter. Dilute four tablespoons flour with cold water to the consistency to pour, add to sauce in pan, stir until well blended, season with salt and pepper; let simmer ten minutes, then strain around meat. Garnish with sprays of parsley or cress.
A braised stuffed flank steak that behaves exactly like a modern braise once you translate the fat, the vessel and the oven heat. The hinge is the temperature: this needs a bare simmer for three hours or more, and a hot oven will squeeze the roll tight and dry.
- CottoleneA cottonseed-oil shortening sold by the N. K. Fairbank Company and heavily advertised as a lard substitute; it has not been made for generations. Use any neutral oil with a high smoke point, or beef tallow, for the initial browning.
- "Casserole" and Dutch ovenHere a casserole is a heavy lidded pot for stovetop-to-oven use, not the shallow baking dish the word now suggests. A cast-iron Dutch oven that holds the roll snugly is ideal.
- Oven temperatureThe recipe gives no number, only "cook very slowly." A slow oven, somewhere in the 275-300F range, matches the three-to-four-hour instruction; judge by the liquid, which should barely tremble rather than bubble.
- The steak itselfA 2.5 lb flank is larger than most sold today, where 1.5-2 lb is typical. Buy two if needed, or butterfly a thick one and pound it to an even half inch so it rolls without gaps.
- Sewing versus tyingThe original assumes a trussing needle and thread. Butcher's twine tied at 1-inch intervals holds just as well and comes off in seconds; tuck the ends in before tying rather than sewing them.
- The stuffingThe recipe cross-refers to a stuffing on page 154 rather than giving one here. Whatever you use, keep the layer genuinely thin — a thick one swells, splits the seam, and turns to paste in a four-hour braise.
- Tomato pulpTwo cups of stewed and strained tomato is roughly one 28-oz can of whole tomatoes, crushed and pushed through a sieve, or a 15-oz can of plain tomato puree loosened with water.
- ThickeningFour tablespoons of flour is heavy for the volume of sauce left after a long braise; start with two, simmer the full ten minutes to cook out the raw taste, and add more only if it stays thin.
- Yield and restingServes six generously. Let the roll sit ten minutes before cutting the twine, then slice across the roll in half-inch rounds so the spiral holds together.
Stuffed and rolled flank steak belongs to the large family of braised beef rolls that appear across nineteenth-century cookery — beef birds, olives, roulades — all of them ways of making a tough, well-worked cut serve as a Sunday centerpiece. Flank is one of the cheapest cuts on the animal and one of the least forgiving: scored, stuffed, and given three or four slow hours in tomato and aromatics, it turns tender and slices handsomely. The tell that dates this page is Cottolene, a cottonseed-oil shortening whose maker produced promotional cookbooks; 52 Sunday Dinners was published in that orbit, which is why a branded fat sits in the ingredient list beside bay leaf and Worcestershire. The book's premise — one full dinner for each Sunday of the year, arranged by month — reflects a middle-class household planning around seasonal markets.