Steak, Potato and Arugula Salad with a Chimichurri Dressing

If you're wondering about the potato dish I made on Food Network Star, episode 6, this is basically it. Circo New Years of 2016! Except this is way healthier as I made it predominantly as a salad. I won this challenge and was given an advantage in the next round. So you know it was good. Original blog post follows...

What do you do when you have a ton of left over whole beef tenderloin from Christmas? You find lots and lots of uses for it. As I had ruled out a meat chandelier early on, and didn’t think a beef hat would be fitting either, I decided to eat it. Well, my husband and I did. Another delicious use of the tenderloin was the beef tenderloin au-jus. But this dish was also quite phenomenal. When I told my husband I was doing a steak and potato salad he thought I was nuts. But after he ate some, I converted him. Because let’s be honest, were talking about peppery arugula, combined with one of the best cuts of red meat, warm and crunchy oven roasted potatoes and a delicious chimichurri style dressing. There’s not much to not love.

So if you find yourself with any kind of left over steak, or maybe you want to give beef or chicken a go… then this hearty but light salad fits the bill. And assuming you don’t enjoy the taste of sawdust or general flavor of cat food, then this tasty dish checks off the palette box too.

I didn’t weigh or measure my cooked meat to determine portion size, so you’re on your own for that. But I do know how many potatoes I cooked, and how much dressing I made. So dressing, potato and arugula wise, I’m going to label this with a:

Serves 4-6

For the Oven Roasted Potatoes:

28 oz “Celebration” potatoes (This was a bag of small potatoes that had purple, fingerling and golden potatoes. If your grocer doesn’t have this, just find a bag of small potatoes.)

3 tbsp olive oil

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

1 tsp garlic powder

1 tsp coriander

1. Clean and quarter your potatoes

2. Mix the quartered potatoes in a bowl with the other ingredients listed above until they are evenly coated.

3. Empty the bowl onto a silicone mat on baking sheet and spread them out evenly.

4. Bake at 400 degrees for roughly 45 minutes.

5. When one has cooled enough to bite, taste it and see if you feel it needs more salt. I decided to sprinkle a little more salt on mine.

For the Chimichurri Style Dressing:

1 cup extra virgin olive oil

¼ cup lime juice

¼ cup red wine vinegar

6 garlic cloves

¾ of a bushel cilantro

¾ of a bushel parsley

1 tbsp dried oregano

½-1 tsp salt (start low and add more if need be)

½-1 tsp red pepper flakes

¼ cup water

1. Combine all ingredients (except the cilantro and parsley) into a food processor and blend/puree for 30-60 seconds.

2. Add the remaining herbs and pulse until they are quite small and have created a green flecked dressing. Taste and see if you want to add more salt or red pepper flakes.

You will also need 4-6 servings of salad size meat portions (steak varieties would be the best).

As well as optional parmesan for shaving. (Take a vegetable peeler and drag it down a wedge of parmesan to make parmesan shavings.)

Arugula- About 8 oz, or two regular size boxes

Other tasty additions could be raw or grilled grape tomatoes, grilled corn or whatever you dream up!

Toss the ingredients together and serve. If you are only making a few servings at a time, only dress what you presently plan on eating. Otherwise the acidity in the dressing will make your arugula super soggy overnight.

*If you're looking at the date on this post and thinking meat from Decmeber 25th would be pretty gross left over till late January, you would be correct ear sir! ButIi am such a fragmented mess with a back log of scrumptious recipes. So cut me some slack judgey-mc-judgersons. Its not like your life is perfectly in order!!! :)