Thursday, January 7, 2010

Ivan's Legendary Steaks

Best dinner party of Dec 2009!
December is often the month of merry feasting. One of the best dinner parties I had was at Ivan's, who kindly invited fellow food bloggers Brad, Cheryl, Leroy and Yixiao for a steak feast. We were in for a treat! Cos if anyone knows his steak, it's Ivan!


Fat = Flavour!
Here you go... 21-day dry-aged ribeye beauties, each weighing in at 800 grams!


Momotaro on bed of spinach with Dijon vinaigrette
We proceeded first with a delightful tomato salad. Normally, I'm not a fan of tomatoes but I couldn't get enough of these sweet, firm and juicy Momotaro. The Dijon vinaigrette made it all come together beautifully.


Braised oxtail in red wine jus
This was followed by braised oxtail stew in red wine jus. Delicious! The meat was fall-off-the-bone tender. Ivan felt he didn't put enough red wine into this, but I was feeling the wine effect more from the soup than from my glass! We mopped up the soup with lots of baguette.


Potatoes in herbed butter
Baby potatoes in herbed butter. We wolfed this down as well, and almost forgot to keep a portion for Yixiao, who was stuck at work on the other end of the island (she missed the dinner eventually, a pity).


Lovingly seasoned with salt and pepper
And on to the main event, the steaks. If you have good meat, salt and pepper is all you need for seasoning, just before it goes into the pan.


Sizzling in premium butter
Sizzling in a good dollop of browned butter...can you smell it?


Look at the gorgeous char
Almost ready...


And that ain't a small thumb!
Ivan is famous for his thumb shots (to show relative size). And that ain't a small thumb!


Grilled cow
Mmmh mmmhh! Would you just look at that!


Beautifully rare
Beautifully rare inside. Pure beefy flavour. Amazingly clean-tasting. I loved the charred bits too.


Steak with Balsamic Vinegar Reduction
We were so excited to eat, we forgot the balsamic vinegar reduction. That just means round two! Hahaha. Yes, well, the second slab tasted even better!


Cheryl's Apple Pie
And for dessert, Cheryl baked a gorgeous apple pie! We really enjoyed this. The crust was buttery perfection, and the fillings just the right balance of sweet and tart.


Apple Pie with Vanilla and Rum & Raisin Ice Cream
We had it with various ice creams - vanilla, rum & raisin, stem ginger...


Burp!
It was a fun, laid-back evening. Ivan regaled us with travel stories, especially of Hungary where ironcially people never get hungry (food portions are apparently HUGE there). We chatted til late and even got a tour of the house! A couple of wines, including this rare, exotic dessert wine made us all very happy people.

Thanks, Ivan, for a memorable dinner!
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23 comments

  1. Wow! NHK sure gave an awesome treat! The steak looks so beautiful! :P

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  2. any chance that Ivan and Cheryl would share the receipe? I'd love to give it a try on my own..

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  3. arghhhhh if only i could turn back time ;(

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  4. @ anony, naturally since he's got a big heart.

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  5. Great post, and big shout out to Ivan for inviting us! hee it was an awesome dinner, lets have more parties like this! :))

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  6. yixiaooo said...

    @ anony, naturally since he's got a big heart.

    don suan brad leh LOL

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  7. Oh My God ! Look so delicious, would very much like to have a taste of it !!

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  8. sounds like the perfect party i've in mind!
    great company, coupled with comfy settings, and of course food the way you want it to be!
    i assuming the dessert wine was tokaji!

    ivan should have prepared some goulash and palacsinta (hungarian dessert) too!

    happy new year!

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  9. WOW! This is making me super hungry.

    Can I be friend with Ivan? Pleaseeeeeee...... :D

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  10. oh you had a tokaji dessert wine! really a treat wasn't it?

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  11. what a steak!! that kinda size, i would thought some oven time would have been better than to just sear it.

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  12. This meal is a cardiologist's dream come true! Unfortunately for the cardiologist, market prices in Singapore for high quality fresh beef have got to be the highest on the planet. When I see all the farm land in Malaysia and down in Indonesia (ie Batam), it is very hard to understand why there isn't any outrage over Singpaore's very high food prices. God forbid there's a request for cheese to go with that tomato salad...that'll break the bank!

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  13. Anonymous sound like ieat aka leslie tay..

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  14. Can i ask. whats brown butter? i mean when u cook the steak, what do u use so that the steak dun stick when cooking? many thanks... the steak was v v big... where u buy de? how much?

    sorry so many questions =)

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  15. Humongous portion of meat, enough to feed 2 at least

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  16. What camera you using?

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  17. OMG! epic! i am so jealous.. when you wrote can you smell it... i could!

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  18. drooling already at the sight of the steak sizzling in ze pan!

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  19. omg the entire dinner looks amazing! it sounds awesome. and may i know where the stem ginger ice-cream was from?

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  20. Wow so many comments, thank you all...I shall try to reply the ones with questions. Sorry for the delay!

    Firstly, yes, it was an EPIC meal indeed!

    @latteaddict: hehe, you can try asking them for recipes!

    @LeMarque and @Blank Doll: the dessert wine was the Essencia - the richest and rarest of all Hungarian Tokaji wines! Supplies were totally wiped out in 2008 for the World Summit in Hokkaido.

    @FC: browned butter is just butter that's been browned - cooked until it's turned a little brown (not black, ok! lol)

    @Anon: camera? Canon 400D with kit lens

    @Chenyze: it was a Waitrose tub, if not mistaken.

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  21. That is one epic steak and dinner! Would really love to eat a home-cooked steak like that!

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  22. http://www.spizza.sg/

    A Pizza for delivery or dining at our restaurant?
    Best pizza delivery in Singapore, also available at our restaurants. Serving exclusively traditional tasting wood-fired thin-crusted pizzas.

    ReplyDelete

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