Pan fry steak with creamy mushroom sauce

We’ve cooked steak in so many ways that we could probably write a book just about that. However, today’s recipe is one of our favourite ways of how to prepare steak – and it’s even better when we can do it outside on the fire.

It’s such a simple recipe, but it’s bursting with flavour. We’re going to kick off with the creamy mushroom sauce and then moving on to the mouth-watering steak. Oh, and halfway through the recipe we’re going to show you one of our regular evening visitors in our garden.

All the ingredients you’ll need for this recipe

Put it on the table – Creamy mushroom sauce:

Let’s start with the creamy mushroom sauce. Try to use fresh mushrooms (and not the ones you buy in a can), this give a little more substance to the sauce.

Ingredients for the creamy mushroom sauce

250g button mushrooms, sliced

½ cup fresh cream

3 small onions (or 1 big onion), chopped

4 cloves garlic, chopped

¾ cup vegetable stock

1 tablespoon butter

salt & pepper to taste

As always, we start with the onions. Heat a little oil in the pan and fry the onions until soft.

Fry onion until soft

Add the butter and then the mushrooms. When the mushrooms are soft, it’s time to add the chopped garlic. Also add salt and pepper to taste.

Add the butter and mushrooms

Add garlic

After the garlic has fried for a while with all the ingredients, add the vegetable stock and let it simmer on a low heat for about 10 minutes.

Add vegetable stock

The last ingredient, the cream, is now stirred in. Let it simmer slowly until it starts to thicken. Set aside while preparing the steak.

Stir in the cream

Before we continue with the recipe, here is a photo of (one) of our regular evening visitors. There are about 8-10 geckos in our garden and every evening, at sunset, they come out and sit near the outdoor lights where they catch small moths and other flying insects. It’s amazing to see how they climb walls with their sticky toes.

Look how spread out those tiny toes are

Put it on the table – Pan fry steak:

The pan fry steak takes about 10 minutes – depending on how thick the steak is. And remember, using fresh herbs is always better.

Ingredients for the pan fry steak

250g steak (sirloin/rump)

4 garlic cloves, chopped

few sprigs of thyme

few sprigs of rosemary

2 tablespoons butter

salt & pepper to taste

avocado oil (to fry the steak in)

Heat the avocado oil and after the steak has been seasoned both sides, place it in the skillet over the heat.

Steak in the skillet

Add the butter to the pan with the steak and then the garlic. Give it a minute and then add the thyme and rosemary.

Add the butter, garlic, thyme and rosemary

Let the flavours release in the butter and tilt the pan as you lift the steak so that the liquid covers the bottom of the pan. Use a spoon to pour some of the liquid over the steak – do this several times.

Let the flavours fill the pan and steak

After searing the steak and turning it a couple of times, you can put the garlic and herbs for a while on top of the steak for that extra flavour.

Heat the creamy mushroom sauce while the steak gets ready

Wish you could smell this

Just before serving you can remove the garlic and herbs from the steak. Before slicing the steak, let it rest for about 10 minutes (you want to keep those wonderful juices in the steak). And what better to serve it with than oven baked fries (or chips as they are known in South Africa).

Pan fry steak with creamy mushroom sauce and oven baked chips

If you are a meat eater, this will become a favourite dish in your house.