Steak En Croute (All the Pâté Must GO!)

I’ve been meaning to publish this post for a while, but haven’t had the chance to finish it. I needed to use the last of the Christmas pâté (see Pâté Stuffed Chicken Thighs & Legs for an alternative way to use it up). I knew I had some beef fillet in the freezer so I decided to use the pate in the place of the mushroom duxelle usually used in Beef Wellington and make individual steak en croute. The only problem was I didn’t have any pastry. I did have all the ingredients to make pastry (butter, lard, and flour) so I decided to try my hand at making rough puff pastry (quick puff). This turned out to be really easy, and a great success. I’ll post the recipe and method next week, I promise!

This improvised recipe turned out quite well, the only issue I had was the steaks were quite thin, and the pastry took longer than expected to cook so I ended up with fillet that was getting on for well-done. Luckily because it was wrapped in the pastry with the pâté it was still really moist and tender. If I used steaks that thin again I’d brown it for 30 seconds, instead of  the 90 seconds I had browned it for.

I was very pleased with the pastry and I think got just as good a result as I would have using shop-bought puff pastry.

Ingredients:

Fillet steak – 1 per person

Pâté – 1-2oz/25-50g per person

Rough puff pastry (or shop-bought puff) – dough made with 4oz/125g flour

Olive oil – for steak and greasing

Egg – 1 for glaze

Equipment: Rolling pin, knife, frying pan, plate, spoon, baking try lined with baking paper/tin foil, pastry brush

Method:

1. Heat the frying pan on a hot hob. Coat the steaks with a little olive oil and brown for 30 seconds either side. Set aside to cool. 
2. Roll out the pastry to about 0.5cm thick. Cut to size with the knife.
3. Preheat the oven to 210°C/Fan 190°C/Gas 7, and place the lined and oiled baking tray in to heat up and avoid a soggy bottom on the pastry.
4. When the steak is cool place on the pastry and top with the pâté.
5. Brush the egg around all sides of the pastry, and fold over and in at the edges so it’s firmly sealed.
6. Place on the preheated baking tray, brush with egg, and make small incisions in the top steam to escape.
7. Bake in the top half of the oven for about 25 minutes until the pastry is golden brown.
8. Leave to rest on a warm plate for 5 minutes before serving.