Planked Steak
Nearly all planking boards are now fitted out with steel rods or bars to hold the steak in place and grooves for the conservation of the gravy. Before using, heat the board very hot before the fire or in the oven, lay the steak on and fasten into place. Brush over with olive oil or melted butter; dust with salt and pepper and lay the plank in the broiler chamber of a gas range for at least fifteen minutes. Baste frequently and reverse the plank from time to time.
While the steak is cooking press fresh-boiled potatoes through a ricer; season with salt and pepper; add a little butter and cream; and beat with a fork until very light. When the steak is nearly done take the board from the oven; put the beaten potato into a pastry bag and force through the tube, rose fashion, at regular intervals along the edge of the steak on the board.
Between the potato roses make little mounds of cauliflower, mushrooms, spinach or onions. Return to the oven and allow them to brown delicately. Garnish with cress and send the steak to the table on the plank, setting it on a large platter or tray
Planking is a serving method as much as a cooking one: a thick steak broiled on a hot hardwood board, framed with piped potato and vegetables, and carried to the table on the wood. The technique still works, but the equipment assumed here no longer exists in most kitchens.
- The plank itselfIt must be untreated hardwood -- oak, hickory or maple, an inch or more thick, never plywood, glued laminate or anything varnished or oiled with a finishing product. Season a new plank by rubbing it with a neutral oil and heating it empty at 400F for an hour or so, which drives out moisture and reduces the chance of splitting or flaring.
- "The broiler chamber of a gas range"On a gas range of this period the broiling chamber was a separate compartment, usually below the oven, heated by a gas flame rather than by the very close element of a modern electric broiler. If the wood scorches before the steak is done, finish the plank in a hot oven -- around 450-500F -- rather than directly under an element two inches from the meat.
- Smoke and flare-upA hot plank under a hot steak smokes, and dripping fat on bare wood can ignite. Run the exhaust fan, set the plank on a sheet pan, and keep the drip channel clear rather than letting fat pool at the edge.
- Cut and thicknessPlanking is worth doing only on a thick steak -- a 1.5 to 2 inch sirloin, porterhouse or top-cut club, 2 to 3 lb, serving three or four. A thin steak will be grey through before the potato browns.
- Fifteen minutes is a floor, not a timeThe original says "at least fifteen minutes." Go by an instant-read thermometer: 125-130F at the centre for medium rare, pulled before the garnish goes back in, since the hot board keeps cooking the underside.
- Searing firstWood does not brown meat the way iron does. For a proper crust, sear both sides hard in a heavy pan or over a live fire, then transfer to the heated plank to finish and to be garnished.
- The potato borderClose to duchesse potato, though the classic duchesse is bound with egg yolk while this is riced potato with butter and cream. Keep it stiff -- only a spoonful or two of cream, not a loose mash -- or the roses will slump and spread when they go back into the heat. A large star tube pipes best.
- VegetablesCook the cauliflower, mushrooms, spinach or onions fully beforehand. Their return to the oven is for colour only, three to five minutes, and anything raw will still be raw.
- After servingScrape and wipe the plank while warm, wash without soaking, and dry it upright. A plank left wet or scrubbed with detergent warps and holds off-flavours.
Planked meat and fish descend from an open-fire method -- a fillet nailed to a board and set slanting before the coals -- which American cookbooks associate with shad cooked on the banks of the Delaware and Hudson in the nineteenth century. Toward the end of the century hotel and chophouse cooks had moved it indoors and turned it into display: planked steak arrived at the table on its own smoking board, ringed with piped potato and vegetable mounds, and became a fixture of American restaurant menus through the First World War. Suggestive of the period is the opening line about boards "now fitted out with steel rods or bars" and gravy grooves; planking had become popular enough that manufacturers were selling purpose-built hardware for it, and a loose-leaf domestic-science manual of the sort this appears to be could assume a home cook owned one. The garnish of piped potato recalls professional French practice, evidence of how thoroughly professional kitchen technique had filtered into the better American household books by this period.