Curtis Stone's pan-seared scotch fillet with creamed leeks

I don't know about you, but I love a good steak. Now this is my pan

seared scotch fillet with creamed leeks and horseradish sauce. When you

know how to cook a perfect steak, you'll always be able to put up a dish to

impress. All you have to do is start with quality ingredients. Throw

together some great-tasting side dishes, and you can't go wrong. I'll show

you how to make my pan-seared steak with creamed leeks and

horseradish, I think you're gonna absolutely love it. You want to get your

steaks out of the fridge well ahead of time. You can see I've put mine right

here. Let them come up to room temperature. With scotch fillets, you're

looking for a vibrant colour with white flecks of fat through the meat. It's

called marbling and it's going to render out as the steaks cook, keeping

the meat moist and juicy. The first thing I'm going to do is make a vinegar

reduction for the creamed leeks. You need a small pan, just like this one

right here. And I'm going to use half sherry vinegar and half white wine

vinegar to add to the pan and then I've got some shallots which I’ve finely

chopped, and some parsley stalks. Now we're gonna let that come up to

the boil. Of course, it's called a reduction for that reason, it's going to

reduce down over a medium-high heat until it's almost dry. To cook the

leeks, you melt the butter in a large, wide pan and then you go ahead

over a medium heat, add your leeks and season it with salt and pepper.

Now you want to saute the leeks for about 15 minutes or until they're

tender, but you want to do it without colour. You don't want them to

caramelise. The reason that you're reducing the vinegar, of course, is to

intensify the flavour because you end up with a lot less volume, but all

that beautiful, acidic flavour, so it really is very, very punchy. Now once it's

reduced down to absolutely nothing or a couple of teaspoons of liquid. Go

ahead, remove those parsley stalks. Take that reduction and add it to

your leeks but not before the leeks have sweat down, they’re nice and

soft and there’s no liquid left. Now, stir in the reduced shallot vinegar

mixture and then add the cream. So reduce it to a medium-low heat and

cook for about five to six minutes. It's going to thicken that cream. It'll just

coat the leeks. So once it's had five or six minutes, you remove it from the

heat. We're going to pop it down here on my trivet and then add just that

last little bit of butter. That's going to give it a perfect bit of richness. You

want to have a wire rack ready for resting the steaks. I stick it over an

oven tray just like this so they're not sitting in their juices while they're

resting. Alright, next, you want to get yourself these beautiful rib eyes, I

brush them with just a little bit of olive oil. The truth is that gorgeous

marbling will mean you don't need much oil at all, but I still just brush

them ever so lightly just like that. And then season them with some

coarse sea salt, and some freshly ground black pepper. Now be generous

because, of course, you’re seasoning the steak on the outside. Don't

forget, it's impossible for you to season the inside of the steak. So make

sure you use plenty of salt and pepper. Okay, in a nice hot pan, now this

part’s important, whether it's a cast-iron pan, non-stick, doesn't matter -

you can even go outside and do it on the barbie - but a medium to high

heat is essential because you want to get that beautiful seer. Okay, here

we go. The side that you seasoned, of course, is the side that goes into

the pan. And then we can season this side of the steak while it's cooking.

Now your steak should be caramelised on each side and for a medium-

rare, oh look at that, beautiful golden brown is exactly what you want.

Gorgeous. For medium-rare, there should be only a slight little resistance

when you press on the top of that steak. Once you've given the steaks

two or three minutes, go ahead and remove them. I literally take them

over to my resting rack here. Place your steaks on. And then with any of

that excess fat, you can go ahead straight over the top like so. Now you

can use the juices left in the pan to make your sauce and if the pan looks

dry, just add a teaspoon of oil. So take your shallots. They've been finely

chopped, give it a little shake around. Now because we've cut it nice and

fine, it'll only take about 30 seconds or a minute to soften. Stir in the beef

stock and the cream. Let it come up to a boil. There’s my beef stock.

Once you add the cream and the beef stock, it's gonna simmer for about

three to four minutes then the sauce will have reduced by about a quarter.

Take it off the heat, stir in the horseradish cream, the mustard and the

thyme. All these flavours are a perfect match for the steak. My sauce is

almost there. The last thing I need to do for those leeks remember, is

chop that parsley. Now what do I do is I kind of roll it into a tight little ball,

just like this. Hold it nice and tight. And then you can slice straight on

through it with a nice sharp knife. Take your parsley, we're gonna add it to

our leeks. Stir that in. The moment we've all been waiting for - this steak

is going to be so good. Bring it over here that gorgeous scotch fillet, also

known as a rib eye. Now I always kept my steak straight through, oh look

at that. Perfect medium-rare. I mean, looking at this beautiful, perfectly

cooked steak. And you'll also notice there's no juice running all over my

cutting board. To me, that's really important because what we're getting,

you guys, is that perfect juice inside the steak. I can't even wait. I'm sorry,

forgive me. I just need to do it. I mean, you can just see how moist and

juicy the steak’s gonna be. And then add this to the other guy. Just like

that. All that's left to do is serve this up to your friends or family, those

melted leeks with that beautiful creamy sauce. It is just so delicious.

You've got to love the classics, don’t ya? Bon appetit, everyone. Don’t

mind if I do. Oh yeah