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Sirloin Steaks, Cabaret
Mix on a plate one tablespoon oil with a teaspoon salt and half teaspoon white pepper; then gently roll in six small, nicely flattened sirloin steaks of five ounces each. Arrange them on a broiler and broil on a moderate charcoal fire for six minutes on each side. Remove, dress on a hot dish and keep hot. Cut three medium, peeled, raw potatoes into half-inch squares. Wash and drain well. Heat two tablespoons lard in a small frying pan; add the potatoes. Season with half teaspoon salt and two saltspoons white pepper. Toss them well while heating for two minutes; then slowly cook on the range for ten minutes, frequently tossing them meanwhile; then set the potatoes in the oven for six minutes. Remove, lift up with a skimmer, place them around the steaks. Spread the cabaret sauce over the steaks evenly and serve.
N. B. Prepare the sauce first, and when the potatoes are placed in the oven broil the steaks, so that both will be ready at about the same time.
A hotel-style plate from the era of the grill room: small flattened steaks, cubed potatoes cooked in three stages, and a sauce the recipe assumes you have already made. The timing note at the end is the useful part of the original.
- The sauce is elsewhereNo sauce recipe is given here. "Cabaret sauce" is presumably given elsewhere in the book; without it you are simply making broiled steak with fried potatoes. The N.B. tells you to prepare the sauce first, so track it down before starting.
- SaltspoonsA saltspoon is a quarter teaspoon, so two saltspoons of white pepper is half a teaspoon. That is a lot of pepper for three potatoes by modern taste; start with half and adjust.
- Six minutes a side is too longA five-ounce sirloin pounded flat will be cooked through well before twelve minutes. Over a hot bed of coals, two to three minutes a side takes a flattened steak of that size to medium; use an instant-read thermometer at 130-135F for medium-rare rather than the clock.
- "Moderate charcoal fire"Coals burned down to a light grey ash, hand held five inches above the grate for four or five seconds comfortably. A gas grill on medium, or a hot ridged pan, gives a broadly similar result indoors, though not the smoke.
- Oven temperatureNone is stated. The potatoes go in only to finish crisping and dry off, so 400-425F for the six minutes suits; the pan must be ovenproof, which a cast-iron or steel skillet is.
- Lard and the potato methodTwo tablespoons of lard for three potatoes is a shallow fry, not a deep one. Any high-smoke-point fat works, but lard or beef dripping gives the period flavour. Washing and draining the cut potatoes removes surface starch so they colour rather than stick together.
- Rest the steaksThe main text has the steaks broiled first and kept hot on a dish while the potatoes are cooked, though the N. B. reverses the order so both finish together. Either way, hold them somewhere warm but not over direct heat, and pour any collected juices into the sauce.
- YieldSix steaks, so six servings, with about half a potato each. That is a light garnish by current standards; a green vegetable or a larger quantity of potato rounds out the plate.
This is restaurant cooking transcribed for the home, from a book compiled by Alexander Filippini, long a chef at Delmonico's in New York. The instruction to flatten the steaks is practical enough, since a pounded five-ounce cut cooks fast. Names of this kind were fashion labels as much as descriptions, and a sauce called "cabaret" in one house bore no fixed relation to one of the same name in another.