Beef tartare on bread

Today I made steak tartare. It turned out I’d bought a little too little beef fillet (ha, at 115 PLN per kilogram, that’s getting a bit excessive), so I served it „on sandwiches” rather than in the classic way.

Our company Christmas party inspired me. Admittedly, that was ages ago, but it’s still fresh in my memory. The plan was like that of most company Christmas parties: first we eat, then we drink. Darek took everyone’s drinks orders, and it turned out we’d be celebrating with whisky.

Unfortunately, steak tartare appeared on the table. The food was actually pretty good. At first the tartare just sat there, waiting until the first volunteer came along to taste it. But it wasn’t individual portions served to each person: it was a whole great, enormous platter of tartare on pieces of baguette.

It ended badly, because you don’t wash down tartare with whisky. So there was whisky, vodka and tartare, and to this day I’m not quite sure what we were washing down with what. But it was a brilliant time. And that tartare made such an impression on me that I’ve occasionally ordered it ever since. Which is rather odd, as I’d never been particularly fond of raw meat before.

So today I made tartare with all the ingredients mixed in from the start. I thoroughly recommend it, and I think it’s delicate enough to appeal to everyone.

At a glance:

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Serves: ingredients for 1 portion

How many calories: even Jacek can have some, so none at all

Ingredients for beef tartare on bread:

• 10 dag of beef fillet
• half a fermented cucumber
• half a small onion
• 1 hen’s egg yolk
• half a tablespoon of olive oil
• 6 anchovy fillets
• freshly ground black pepper
• salt

Recipe for truly manly tartare (hmm, but this isn’t chauvinism):

I chopped the onion and cucumber very finely (a very fine dice). I put them in separate little bowls. I prepared the remaining ingredients (the yolk, olive oil, pepper and salt, and the anchovy fillets).

I thoroughly washed the piece of fresh beef fillet and dried it with kitchen paper. I removed the membrane (my piece had one on one side) and cut it into narrow strips. Then I chopped it with a chef’s knife for about 6 – 8 minutes, until the meat was very soft and tender (next time I’ll record a video of chopping beef for tartare).

Basically, the chopping goes like this: I chop, the meat breaks into little pieces, then I gather it into a ball and keep chopping. I repeat this many times until the meat has a smooth, „spreadable” consistency.

I put the prepared meat in a bowl, added freshly ground pepper (quite a lot), the yolk, 1 tablespoon of chopped onion and 1 tablespoon of chopped cucumber. I mixed thoroughly and added half a tablespoon of olive oil. I mixed again, added a little salt and mixed once more.

I served it on rye bread, adding one anchovy fillet to each slice and sprinkling on more freshly ground black pepper. The tartare for sandwiches is ready. Enjoy!