Steak and beans

Eastside Road, Healdsburg, July 31, 2009—

IT'S A CLASSIC, though I'm not sure it qualifies for the Hundred Plates: steak and beans. Cowboy food.

I began by chopping up myrtle — Myrtus communis compacta, a small-leafed myrtle growing as a short hedge in the garden — with a clove of garlic, the grated zest of a lemon, and a little black pepper. I'd salted the hanger steak (I prefer that spelling to "hangar," who knows which is right) as soon as I brought it home and put it in the refrigerator for a few hours.

Steak, rubbed both sides with the myrtle mixture, was grilled over charcoal and grapevine cuttings until done. Meanwhile, Lindsey had shelled beans, some from a nearby farm, some from the garden, and cooked them simply in water. Pythagorus would not like this.

A drizzle of olive oil on the sliced steak and the beans. Sliced tomatoes on the side. Green salad, of course.

Var, La Ferme Julien red, 2007