Beef Heart, Balsamic Vinegar & Orange Peel Sauté

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Big, hearty and robust flavours, easy to prepare and very healthy to boot.

Beef heart is also known as the ‘poor man’s steak’. This is somewhat untrue. Preparing beef heart well requires a bit more attention than cooking any steak except maybe sirloin – which is finicky. The in’s-&-outs of beef heart were discussed in my Beef Heart in Brown Onion Gravy post.

To summarise:

• Tender, tasty, quite flavourful and easy to prepare.
• Excellent texture and very fine, firm grain – even more delicate than beef fillet.
• It is virtually pure protein with NO marbling or interstitial fat.
• Heart diet friendly and very nutritious.

Beef heart is somewhat of a Cinderella figure in the pantheon of beef cuts and sections. Granted, it does look a tad alien ‘in the flesh’ with it’s massive tubes entering and exiting at the top and the coronary arteries snaking all over it’s surface. The internal valve structures and attendant tendon strings can be off putting for the non-farm raised as well... Do not fret, once it is cleaned up and processed, heart muscle tissue becomes a joy to work with.

Fresh beef heart may be hard to find. The old fashioned, independent neighbourhood butcheries may be able to help. The rise in popularity of the paleo cooking and cuisine movement should make it easy to find fresh heart at a supporting supplier. Suppliers to the Orthodox Jewish communities may also be able to assist.

Locally (in sunny South Africa), fresh beef heart is hard to find unless you have access to a farmer who still butcher and process his own cattle. Some of the bigger, semi-specialised butcheries still supply beef heart as frozen sections, usually quartered lengthwise.

Frozen beef heart requires slow, refrigerator defrosting over a ± 48 hours period. ‘Fast’ defrosting at room temperature in the kitchen sink will lead to excessive internal fluid loss, rendering the muscle tissue dry and tough on cooking.

The trimming and preparation of beef heart was discussed in the Method section of the above mentioned Beef Heart in Brown Onion Gravy post. Heart requires a modicum of experience in working with raw meat and a little bit of knife skill. Very sharp knives are a definite requirement as well. Take your heart to your friendly neighborhood butchery for prepping if you do not feel confident enough take on the task. Alternatively, find a family member, friend or acquaintance that hunts and processes his or her own venison and ask them for help.

Recipe yields: 2 Portions

Preparation time: ± 25 Minutes

Cooking time: ± 45 Minutes

Difficulty level: Easy

Special Equipment Required:

1 x Butcher’s knife, shaving sharp

1x Thin bladed, kitchen utility knife, shaving sharp

1 x Spiral type wire whisk

Ingredients:

Cubed beef heart	350g
Dried rosemary	1.2ml
Dried thyme	1.2ml
Sunflower oil	15ml
Medium white onion, finely diced	1
Sunflower oil	15ml
Water	80ml
Balsamic vinegar	15ml
Candied orange peel in syrup, finely diced	10ml
Salt	2.5ml
Beef stock powder	2.5ml
Corn flour	2.5ml
Dried crushed garlic	1.2ml

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Method:

1. Trim and prep the heart as discussed HERE in steps 1 & 2.
2. Slice the prepped muscle tissue lengthwise into thumb wide strips. Cut the strips into thumb wide cubes. Add the rosemary and thyme. Mix well, cover and set aside for 20 minutes at room temperature.
3. Add the herbed beef heart and sunflower in one batch to a medium large, hot sauté pan. Sauté with frequent turning over medium heat until the cubes stop exuding liquid, but are still pink in the center, 7 – 8 minutes.
4. Transfer the meat to a heat proof bowl and cover. Add the second portion of oil to the same pan and sauté the onions over medium heat until it starts to brown and caramelize, 8 – 10 minutes.
5. Combine all the remaining ingredients, mix thoroughly and add it to the browning onions. Turn the heat down to low and use the wire whisk to scrape the bottom of the pan to lift any stuck material while mixing.
6. Cook until the sauce starts to thicken and add the reserved heart with any collected liquid. Stir to warm through and serve immediately, piping hot, on mashed potato, polenta, krummelpap, cous-cous, hominy grits or veggie samp & beans as in this post.

Comments:

• Sauté the beef heart slowly over medium heat. It holds no truck with the “sear-rapidly-on-both-sides-to-seal” movement. Heart tissue has no marbling fat. In normal muscle tissue, the molten, exuding interstitial fat protects the surface of the muscle tissue where it is in contact with the hot pan. Trying to sear and brown diced heart muscle will cause charring and excessive liquid loss before the inside of the cuts are sufficiently cooked. And it will be tough and dry.

– RECIPE INDEX PAGE –

© RS Young, 2018

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