FALL CULINARY CHALLENGE! ARE YOU READY?

December 29, 2023

The weather is cooling! Saturday football is back! It’s almost FALL! With the cooler temperatures, we get to enjoy lots of different recipes.

To help you celebrate fall, we have pulled together a list of recipes and a fall kitchen challenge to stretch your culinary skills. This will be a fun challenge to prepare and enjoy! We hope that this challenge and post will make it easy for you to try some new recipes and maybe find some new fall favorites.

Fall Kitchen Challenge

Week 1: Cube Steak Philly Steak Sandwiches
Week 2: Kabobs & Chuck Roast: Kabob (or stew) beef is great on the grill as kabobs or do it with as easy BBQ burnt ends and do a BBQ or smoked chuck roast
Week 3: Short-Rib: Short ribs are great braised or smoked
Week 4: Beef Stew
Week 5: Cube Steak: Country-fried steak dinner with mushroom gravy? Multiple recipes to choose from
Week 6: Bone-In Shank: This one is a test (which you will ace!). Try out the beef shank in osso bucco. Pick out a good red wine and sides.
Week 7: Sirloin Roast: Make a traditional roast dinner with all the trimmings
Week 8: Chuck Roast: You made it chef! Celebrate with a simple pot roast meal

Recipe Links: It seems like a distant memory of COVID quarantine and cooking most of our meals at home. The business of pre-Covid life seems to have come back in full! We’ve compiled some of these recipe ideas so you can have a delicious (and usually easy) home-cooked meal. We have tried to find recipes that taste great yet aren’t very difficult to prepare. Some of these are our own recipes, others are on our want-to-try list. Let us know how they work out for you!

All of these recipes complement our Fall Kitchen Challenge bundles. These bundles are 1 flat price and you get 2 cuts of beef. Each include enough to feed 4-5 people for 2 meals. If you are planning a party get extra bundles to feed all your guests. All of these cuts are available for sale by the pound if you need more of one.

Some of these cuts you may not know yet. Once you have tried these recipes, I bet they will become new standards in your house.

Cube Steak: Lean cuts of beef from the rump and sirloin roast. Tenderized with 1-2 passes through a roller with blades to create a grid pattern of cuts in the meat. If you have never cooked this cut of meat, you have missed out. For people who grew up in the South (or have eaten at a Cracker Barrel, which is almost the same thing), cube steak is the main cut of meat in country-fried steak. While that recipe is great (see Chicken Fried Steak below), there are so many other ways to prepare it.

- Week 1: Cube Steak Sandwiches: https://emeals.com/recipes/recipe-41369-264302-Cube-Steak-Sandwiches
  - Make it a Philly cheesesteak: Add sautéed mushrooms, onions, and bell peppers
  - Or add pickled hot peppers and beef broth dip for an Italian dip sandwich
  - Or use one of the Italian Parmesan recipes below for a different version
Week 5: 12 cube steak recipes: https://gypsyplate.com/the-best-cube-steak-recipes/ This is a great collection of ways to cook cube steak.
- Healthier Italian Cube Steak: https://www.food.com/recipe/healthier-italian-cube-steak-290737
- Less Healthy Cube Steak Parmesan: https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/77276/cube-steak-parmesan/
  - Cube steak instead of chicken, in a classic chicken parmesan recipe. Delish! The cube steak will give this dish a richer, heartier flavor.
- Cube Steak & Mushroom Gravy: https://www.smalltownwoman.com/cube-steak-and-gravy/
  - This recipe is excellent and a big step up (in the author’s opinion) from Country-Fried steak with (plain) gravy. The mushrooms and onions make it a much nicer meal (plus you get some veggies)
- Gourmet Cube Steak & Mushroom Gravy: https://therecipecritic.com/cube-steaks/
  - Take it up a notch and make it gourmet.
- Classic Chicken Fried Steak: (from the 12 recipe post above) https://www.thecookierookie.com/chicken-fried-steak-with-gravy/
  - If you’ve never made this cut of meat before …. try the classic.

Stew / Kabob Meat: These are lean chunks of beef, approximately 1-inch squares, from the sirloin and rump roast areas. They are perfect for stews or kabobs and there are many other ways to prepare them.
- Week 2: Kabobs on the grill (or cooked in a pan if it is easier)
  - https://therecipecritic.com/creamy-garlic-steak-bites-with-mushrooms/
  - https://therecipecritic.com/grilled-asian-garlic-steak-skewers/
- Marinade for Kabobs: https://therecipecritic.com/worlds-best-steak-marinade/
  - https://houseofnasheats.com/best-beef-kabob-marinade/
- Burnt ends (BBQ): https://www.smokedbbqsource.com/poor-mans-burnt-ends/
  - Mix it up and use them in this BBQ recipe
- Week 4: Beef Stew: A classic when it gets cooler. Put it in the slow cooker or dutch oven and let it cook all day.
  - https://www.spendwithpennies.com/beef-stew-recipe/
  - https://www.onceuponachef.com/recipes/beef-stew-with-carrots-potatoes.html

Bone-In Shank: This flavorful cut of meat is not well known. We’ve included our favorite recipe, Osso Bucco, which is typically done with mutton. We think it is better with beef. However, there are a few other ways to prepare this cut of beef.
- Week 6: Osso Bucco
  - https://www.thekitchenmagpie.com/osso-bucco-braised-beef-shanks-recipe/
  - https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/osso-buco-recipe-2013380

Sirloin Roast: This roast is much leaner than a chuck roast but has more fat and marbling than an eye of round roast. We find it makes a much more tender roast than the eye of round. It is lean, so will become tough if over cooked. It is critical to let it defrost to room temperature before cooking to maximize tenderness.
- Week 7: Classic Roast: https://www.food.com/recipe/maries-tender-sirloin-tip-roast-449747
  - https://www.thekitchenmagpie.com/how-to-cook-a-sirloin-roast/
  - Alternative Roast: https://www.thekitchenmagpie.com/how-to-cook-a-sirloin-roast/
- Garlic Steak Bites:
  - Garlic Butter Herb Steak Bites (use a sirloin steak or roast for this recipe): https://gypsyplate.com/garlic-butter-steak-bites/
  - Creamy Garlic Steak & Mushroom Bites: https://therecipecritic.com/creamy-garlic-steak-bites-with-mushrooms/

Chuck Roast: A great roast from the area near the brisket and ribeye. The chuck roast has great marbling, as well as fat and some tendons which provide great flavor. It is a very versatile cut and should be part of your regular menu at home.
- Italian Beef Sandwich: https://www.smalltownwoman.com/crock-pot-italian-beef-sandwiches/
- Week 8: Classic pot roast: (Need to publish the drafted recipe…coming soon)
  - This is our previous blog article with several options to upgrade your recipe with limited extra work. You can do it all in a slow cooker or dutch oven or upgrade your recipe as you choose. Choose your own culinary adventure!
- Braised Beef: https://www.smalltownwoman.com/braised-beef/
- Smoked Chuck Roast: https://www.trucfarm.com/blog/smoked-chuck-roast-yum

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