Steak Tartar. Chef Joan Roca versioned recipe

I recently had the opportunity to go to a course taught by the great Joan Roca and I wanted to adapt the recipe that I liked the most: Steak Tartar by Joan Roca,  both for its ease of making it at home and because it was great.

Although you can’t do everything exactly like Joan, unless you have liquid nitrogen at home for the spherification of mustard mayonnaise, with a little patience and a good quality beef sirloin .

If you like this type of meat cut to accompany your dishes, you can find a lot of sirloin recipes that are sure to succeed at home, you can impress your guests at home.

The dish is simple and very elegant. It is obviously raw meat, seasoned with touches of capers, pickles, onions, mustard, tabasco, Lea Perrins sauce, salt and pepper.

All the accompaniments are placed on it: a few balls of mustard ice cream, a lemon and caper jam, a spiced tomato compote, a sphere of fragrant, a few touches of Foyot sauce and some soufflé potatoes that appear in different places of the plate, one seasoned with chive butter, another with Sechuan pepper, another with cumin and coriander and another with paprika from La Vera.

This is the most elaborate version, the one presented by Joan Roca in his restaurant. Although you can keep the recipe base or consult the most classic version of the Steak Tartar that I also have on the blog. The most important thing is to enjoy one of the recipes that seduce meat lovers.

Preparation of the tartar

1. It is very important when preparing this recipe that the sirloin is of a high quality, do not save with this topic because it depends on it being a 10 point recipe. We chop the meat of the beef sirloin very well with a knife that cuts well, season and reserve. It should be in very small pieces but that can be seen, that it does not become pureed meat.
2. Then chop the onion or a shallot (also valid), the capers and the pickled gherkins. We mix them with the minced meat also adding a little mustard mayonnaise (1/2 Dijon mustard and 1/2 mayonnaise), tabasco, Lea Perrins sauce, salt and freshly ground black pepper. It is convenient to leave this dish to rest in the fridge for about 15 minutes so that the ingredients marinate the meat well.

So far we have the Steak Tartar , almost classic but you are dying, the fewer decorations it takes the better. To continue as Jordi prepared it, and to make it a Michelin-star Steak Tartar, I leave you with the preparation of the accompaniment and the famous Soufflé potatoes.

Preparation of lemon and caper jam

Cut the lemon into a thin brunoise (very small cubes), place in a saucepan together with the sugar and the capers, also very chopped. Let it cook until it acquires a confiture texture. We reserve.

Preparation of the spiced tomato compote

1. We put a saucepan or a frying pan on the fire at medium power so that it reaches temperature. We add the ingredients in the following order: 40 or 50 g of white granulated sugar, a little water (1 tablespoon) and 20gr of wine vinegar.
2. Leave on medium heat without stirring (at first we should not move the sugar with a wooden spoon because it will weigh down) and we will see how little bubbles begin to form little by little and the sugar changes color. When this happens we remove, now yes, with a wooden spoon and we help to mix everything.
3. Remove from the heat and add the tomato puree, remove and season with the rest of the ingredients. We let reduce until obtaining a compote texture.

Joan accompanied the tartar with a Foyot sauce, I substitute it for a Modena vinegar reduction, it is not the same but it is quite good.

Preparation of the Soufflé Potatoes

1. These potatoes are impressive, but they carry a very careful job. Peel the potatoes, cut them into a rectangle, cut 3 mm sheets. and we dry them.
2. Poach the potatoes in extra virgin olive oil at 130ºC, moving the oil in circles with a slotted spoon.
3. We remove them when they are soft, before serving them to our guests, we fry them again, submerging them in aove at 180º C, moving the oil so that they turn and turn golden brown. We remove and pass through absorbent paper.
4. For each serving of tartar we will dress four soufflé potatoes, one with each of the spices.

Finish and presentation

We assemble a rectangle with the tartar in the center of the plate and place the soufflé potatoes on top with a point of the spices in each one: paprika de la vera, Sechuan pepper, cumin and coriander and the curry one. Accompany with the lemon and caper jam and the spiced tomato compote.

In the restaurant it is even more complicated, each bite on the plate has a different taste and taste in the mouth. How do they achieve this? They assemble the meat already seasoned in rectangular silicone molds and put a tear of hazelnut praline at first, then in the second bite another but of homemade kepchup, in the next a lemon jam and finally a spreading of Amontillado wine. Separating each of these bites is a seasoned souffle potato. In the first bite with the praline it goes with paprika, in the second the potato goes with curry, in the next with cumin and finally with chives.

My advice is that you do it first with the classic preparation and little by little as you control more and more cooking, go adding all the haute cuisine techniques of Joan Roca. Absolutely perfect, a delicacy where there are.