Black Pepper Sauce
This famous French recipe (Steak au Poivre) for steak in black pepper sauce, is basically a recipe for a simple grilled or fried tender steak in an easy Black Pepper sauce.
This recipe is similar to my Steak Diane recipe, but still very different in taste. Sometimes the only steak sauce you need to go with steak, is a black pepper sauce.
Belgian Steaks
This simple black pepper sauce recipe reminds me very much of my yearly golfing trips to Belgium. I used to go every year with a big group of friends and play some of the super Belgian golf courses.
These weekends always resulted in a fair amount of serious drinking and eating.
One year, when playing de Rougemont, we ended up near Dinant in a small hotel with a slightly weird hotel owner.
He was not very friendly until we asked him to whip us up some steaks for supper. Then he suddenly became a bit more enthusiastic and disappeared into the kitchen.
He came back with some delicious steaks with the most wonderful black pepper sauce. They tasted just like the one in this black pepper sauce recipe. He also made a very good blue cheese sauce for steaks which we enjoyed on another evening.
Belgian steaks are really very tasty, as is most of the food there. Especially in Wallonia, of course, thanks to their French gastronomic connections.
The fun part of this recipe is the flambé bit when the alcohol in the sauce gets burned off.
You can see in this picture what happens when you go a bit too mad with the Brandy 😃! So be careful!
This is, of course, a bit of a waste really. Better to drink it you may say 😃!
That weekend in Belgium the hotel owners ended up leaving us the key to the bar. Of course, we had emptied it out by the morning. Not many straight drives off the tee that day!
Steak in Black Pepper Sauce
Which is the best steak to use?
I have again used Sirloin steaks in this recipe, but I suppose this can also be served together with a nice piece of tender rump, fillet or rib-eye steak.
According to Wikipedia, steak au poivre is traditionally made with filet mignon, but really you can make this with whatever tender steak cut you like.
I hope you enjoy trying out this recipe. If you do, please let me know how you get on in the comments section below.
Enjoy!
How to make steak in Black Pepper sauce
Steak in Black Pepper Sauce
This recipe will give you a delicious black peppercorn sauce to go with your steak. A good reason not to drink all the brandy...
Ingredients
- 2 x steaks (Sirloin, Filet Mignon, Fillet, Rib-eye or Rump)
- 2 shallots, finely sliced
- 1 tbsp vegetable oil
- 2 garlic cloves, sliced
- ¼ cup brandy
- 80 ml cream
- 200ml beef stock
- 2 tbsp butter
- Sea Salt
- Crushed Black Peppercorns
Instructions
- Make sure you have some good tender steaks. We tend to choose the 30 day aged Black Angus sirloin steaks from Aldi as they are consistent quality and always very tender. Excellent value.
- First, cover your steaks with some baking paper and roll them a bit flatter.
- Season both sides of the steak with sea salt.
- Heat the oil and some butter in a frying pan and add the steaks when the oil is hot enough. Brown the steaks on both sides for about 2,5 minutes per side (to give a medium-rare steak).
- The steak cooking times will be dependent on the size and thickness of the steak so follow any instructions on the steak packaging.
- Then remove the steaks from the pan and place them on a plate to rest. Throw away the used oil/butter in the pan.
- Using the same pan, add the shallots and garlic and cook in some butter for about 2 minutes. Then, being very careful, add the brandy to the pan and allow it to ignite.
- Do this by holding the pan away from you at an angle over the hob (if you are cooking with gas). When the flame dies out, stir the contents around the pan.
- Pour the stock into the pan and allow it to reduce. Add the peppercorns to suit your taste. I believe this sauce should have quite a kick, so I add about 1-2 tbsp.
- Then add the cream and stir well into the sauce. Keeping the pan on the heat, allow the sauce to thicken, stirring constantly.
- Then put the steaks back into the sauce with any juice from the meat. Cook further until they are done as you want them.
Notes
Serve up with fries or some vegetables. Here I served up with some crinkle chips done in the air fryer - quick and easy.
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Nutrition Information:
Yield: 2 Serving Size: 1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 1015Total Fat: 74gSaturated Fat: 33gTrans Fat: 1gUnsaturated Fat: 32gCholesterol: 291mgSodium: 715mgCarbohydrates: 11gFiber: 2gSugar: 5gProtein: 62g
This nutrition information was automatically calculated by Nutritionix, but may not be 100% accurate.