Chicken Fried Steak Ain't Chicken

So everyone that knows me, is well aware that I am not a meat eater. I will eat seafood, but that other stuff...well...ummm... not so much. I was very disturbed at the fact that a recipe is called Chicken Fried Steak, when there is absolutely no chicken involved (this is me being an airhead.) I made sure to ask my group this question several times just to make sure they knew #1 I wasn't excited about this recipe and #2 that the recipe title wasn't well thought out by the culinary greats.

This past week in class, my amazing group members decided that it would be a great idea to chose me to prepare "the cow." I don't like to touch meat so I decided to wear gloves. Thank goodness for gloves. Our head Chef gave a demo on how to bread, season, and cut the beef steak ("the cow"). 
If you want to prepare "the cow" at home, here is what you will need:

1 beef steak
2.5 cups of flour (or more, as needed)
2 eggs beaten
1 cup of milk
2 Tbsp of Salt and Pepper ( be careful not to use too much salt like I did. I almost gave my team & chef a heart attack..but we'll focus on that later)

In two separate pans:
Pan 1: whisk together eggs and milk ( this will be used to dip your steaks in after flouring)
Pan 2: combine flour, salt and pepper. Sift through mixture with spoon or fingers to ensure seasonings are spread out.

On your cutting board:
Place your beef steak on the board, pay close attention to how the fibers in the meat run..if they run this way///// use your knife and cut medium thick slices the opposite direction..if they run this way \\\\\\use your knife and cut slices the opposite way. 

Once your steaks are sliced, take each piece, one by one, wrap it in plastic wrap, and use a steak hammer (or something heavy..like a rolling pin maybe) and beat the steak down until it is very thin. Do this for both sides. Be sure to get an extra pan to sit already flattened meat in for holding. Sit on top of ice (which should be in a separate bowl.) This is just to preserve the freshness of the meat.

When each steak is completely flattened, coat them one by one in the flour mixture, pressing the meat into the flour with your fingers and coating them generously on both sides. Next transfer the steaks to the egg mixture, coat on both sides, and return steaks back to the flour mixture for one final coat. This back and forth transfer is to seal in the egg and flour so the extra crispy factor is added. *Note: this is very messy...Thank goodness, once again, that I wore gloves.

After each piece has been coated, get a large pan and put about 2-3 oz of Extra Virgin Olive Oil in the pan. Allow the oil to get very hot. One way to test it (this is what my grammy taught me) is to sprinkle a little flour in the pan, if it sizzles..your grease is ready! Once your grease is hot, place steaks in oil and allow to brown on both side.

This can be served with steamed vegetables or mashed potatoes and gravy. This gravy can be made from scratch with the oil preserved from your fried beef steaks. I’m not sure if I feel like blogging about how to make the gravy being that I’m still traumatized that I had to make the gravy 4 times…I repeat 4 times in class!! Well I guess the 4^th time was a charm because the chef was pleased with my gravy. As for my salty steaks…not so much. 

Gravy recipe coming soon…and by soon I mean when I stop whining..
xoxo