FHE Flank Steak

Monday nights in my house are known as Family Home Evening* (FHE). The 'rule' is that everyone has to be home on Monday night to cook dinner together and have some kind of together time - whether it's watching a trashy TV show like the Bachelor, or playing board games (this Monday we played DVD Family Feud!). But the goal is to take time out of our busy schedules for a weekly roommate bonding night, filled with delicious food, of course!

Over the past year, we've tried to cook a meal from a different region of the world each week. We've done Thai, Indian, Italian, German, French, Spanish, Jamaican, and so many more. In fact, each week it's harder to think of a new country! Our newest roommate, Suzie, is Polish, so there is certianly Polish food in our future. But when we can't pick a country, we usually try out recipes we've been eyeing, and this week we attempted a Grilled Stuffed Flank Steak...commence mouth watering.


[An aside: Cook's Illustrated is my absolute favorite magazine. I love that they test each recipe in a zillion combinations to find the very best results. Every recipe I've ever made from it has been amazing (except for an unfortunate substitution of spaghetti squash for butternut squash...NOT the same...). So when I saw these flank steak pinwheels in the July/August issue, I had to make them. Plus, with my roommates, anything stuffed with cheese is an immediate winner!]


Grilled Stuffed Flank Steak
from Cook's Illustrated, issue 99

• 1 flank steak (about 2 lbs is a good size)
  
• 2 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 small shallot, minced
• 2 tbsp minced fresh parsley (I used italian parsley because I like it's flavor)
• 1 tsp finely minced fresh sage leaves
• 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 10 strips of bacon (the original recipe calls for 4 oz. prosciutto, but Safeway was fresh out!)
• 4 oz. thinly sliced provolone
• 10 wooden skewers, soaked in water for 30 minutes
• salt and pepper for seasoning

(1) Combine herbs, garlic, shallot and olive oil in a bowl.
(2) Butterfly the flank steak into a rectangle, taking care to cut evenly (I failed at this part and ended up with a few funky roulades...but they still tasted fine!)
(3) Pound the steak flat (we discovered that a small skillet is a good substitute for an actual mallet!)
(4) Place steak open side up, and spread herb mixture evenly over the surface.
(5) Cover the steak with a single layer of bacon (or prosciutto)
(6) Cover the bacon with a single layer of provolone
(7) Starting at the edge closest to you, roll the steak into a tight jelly-roll log, and finish with the seam-side down on the counter.
(8) Skewer the log in evenly-spaced increments so that each pinwheel will be about 1 inch thick. You may want to use string to keep the log together, but we didn't have any on hand, and we made do.
(9) Cut the log into 1 inch pinwheels and then season with salt and pepper
(10) Grill pinwheels until browned, about 3-5 minutes. Flip and repeat for the other side.

The great thing is that the stuffed flank steak can be adapted to include almost anything: sun-dried tomatoes, spinach, pine nuts...let your imagination go!


*Truthfully, I had several close Mormon friends in high school, and I stole the idea of FHE from them.