Fillet of Beef with Mushroom, Gherkin, Tarragon and Dijon Mustard cream sauce.

I took out a lovely piece of fillet, part of a whole fillet I had been sent by Richard from Natsley Farm situated in Exmoor near Barnstable.  Richard has a herd of Ruby Reds, now over 100 cattle having built the herd from scratch 4 years ago.  We had used half the fillet on Christmas Eve in a Beef Wellington and fancied something stodgy to shift a stubborn hangover (all my hangovers seem stubborn these days).  With a piece of meat that good it just had to be griddled on a very hot griddle pan for a few minutes each side and eaten 'blue'.  So the decision was to go for a rich sauce and serve with Taglietelle (and peas as that all i had that was green in the house!)

The sauce needed a good base of stock which (and this is one of the benefits of owning a pub) i purloined from The Mansion.  Andy, my partner in the business and also the head chef is especially good at stocks and sauces.  Veal bones, pigs trotters, onion, celery, carrot, thyme and bay all rendered down over hours leaving a silky smooth gelatinous stock, intense in flavour and a great base for any meaty dish.

The hard part done for me the rest was easy.  Shallots sweated down and the mushrooms added, after they had been cooked a tablespoon of medium sherry was added and cooked off, shortly followed by the stock, Tarragon, Dijon mustard and gherkins.  Checked for seasoning this was left waiting for the cream to be added once the steaks were underway.

The fillet was cut into 7oz steaks and seasoned before being placed on a very hot griddle pan and cooked on both sides for a few minutes each.  The Taglietelle had been put on to cook and as the steaks neared cooking the cream was added to the sauce.  The steaks were removed and rested for a couple of minutes and the plate was plated up with the steak, a generous covering of the sauce and the peas.

The meat was exceptional and I defy anyone to find a better breed of beef (slow grown - 2 years to maturity and only on natural feeds)

So nothing too glamorous, just a very nice piece of meat and a simple sauce - delicious...