Today I got home from work fairly late. No wife, just a crazy brown dog and a tummy craving something fresh. I’ve been a little under the weather the past few days as well. So, needless to say, I didn’t want anything too heavy due to my aching stomach and frequent cough and due to arriving home so late, I didn’t want to spend a great deal of time in the kitchen. Thankfully, I had skirt steak, a lovely organic salad mix and some fresh organic tomatoes.

So, instead of laboring with pasta, or a long grilling process, I opted to go for a steak salad with a delicious balsamic reduction. Here’s the recipe I came up with.

Ingredients

• 6 oz skirt steak (cut thinly into strips)
• 2 cups organic baby greens
• 1 organic tomato cut into wedges
• 1/8 cup of Danish Blue Cheese
• 1/4 cup Balsamic vinegar
• 1 tablespoon vegtable oil
• 1 tablespoon whole black peppercorns
• 1 tablespoon Kosher salt
• 1 tablespoon dried basil
• 1 tablespoon butter (preferably unsalted, if salted, omit Kosher salt mentioned above)

Preparation
Coarsely grind peppercorns and basil with a mortar and pestle. Coat both sides of the skirt strips dry and coat with peppercorns, pressing to adhere. Season with salt.

Heat oil with 1 tablespoon butter in a heavy skillet or non stick pan over moderately high heat until hot but not smoking. Reduce heat to moderate and cook steaks to preferred temperature. I go about 1 to 1 and a half minutes on each side for medium-rare. (Admittedly, I got away from my pan for a minute prepping my plate and my meat came out medium well as you can see from the photos)

Transfer steak to a platter. Add balsamic vinegar to skillet and deglaze by boiling over high heat, scraping up brown bits. Simmer vinegar until reduced to about 1/8 cup. Remove from heat and whisk in remaining tablespoon butter until melted. Season sauce with salt and drizzle over salad once prepared.

To prep the salad itself, I simply wash and toss the greens, crumble my blue cheese and slice a small tomato into wedges. I salt and pepper my tomatoes and ring them around my greens. Add the steak and drizzle your balsamic reduction over everything. What you’re left with is a really flavorful, yet light meal that you’ll want to make again and again. The bold flavors of the Danish Blue Cheese are complimented by the reduction and the tomatoes make a lovely accompaniment. Happy cooking.