Round Steak Simmered with Sherry and Asian Vegetables (Penny Pincher Series #1)

"And they licked the platter clean."

Round Steak has never been my favorite cut of meat.  But, I've found a reasonable and easy dish that is good, tender, and actually very flavorful using a tenderized round steak.  In the scheme of things I just served steak to 5 people with leftovers having spent a little over  $7.00 for the meat.  ($4.99 @ pound boneless)   Not bad.  So today in honor of this humble cut of meat I am starting the Penny Pincher series of money saving meals.

You can ask any meat department butcher to run a round steak through the tenderizer and that helps enormously.  If that is not possible use a meat mallet to tenderize, failing that take a coffee saucer and use the edge to pound the meat.  First in one direction then turning it over pound the opposite direction.

Next I trim off all of the fat and partially freeze the meat.  This will make slicing it into thin strips much easier.

Ingredients for Round Steak Simmered with Sherry:

1 boneless round steak trimmed and sliced into thin strips (1 1/2-2 pounds)
1/2 C. + 2 T. soy sauce
1/4 C. Sherry or cooking wine
2 T. corn starch
2 T. brown sugar
1-2 T. freshly grated ginger
1 generous pinch of dried red pepper flakes
1 can drained sliced water chestnuts
6-8 ounces fresh or frozen snow pea pods
1 onion large dice
oil for stir fry
3-4 C. cooked rice

After slicing the steak place it in a zipper bag with 2 T. soy sauce and combine.  Set aside for now.

Combine the soy sauce, Sherry, corn starch, brown sugar, ginger, and red pepper flakes and whisk until everything has dissolved together.  Add 2 T. of this mixture to the meat and mix.  Set aside.

Prepped vegetables.

Wash the snow peas and remove the ends.  Drain the water chestnuts.

Heat a heavy wide bottomed pan to sizzling hot, preferably cast iron.  Add 1-2 T oil and the peas and water chestnuts. Leave to brown 1-2 minutes than stir.  Fry the second side 1-2 minutes and then remove from the pan.

When the pan is again screaming hot add half of the steak,  Fry 1-2 minutes and turn. Add half of the onions and after 1-2 minutes turn again.  Remove from the pan and repeat with the second portion of the steak.

Next add everything back to the pan.  Add 2-3 tablespoons of water and reduce to the lowest simmer.  Cover tightly and simmer 20-30minutes while the rice cooks.

At serving time stir in the sauce, bring to a boil stirring until it thickens.  Serve immediately over steaming hot rice.

The side dish I served with this was oven roasted carrots and dessert was simple fresh strawberries with sweetened whipped cream.