Quelle cuisson? Rib-eye steak and diced parsnip salad

his was a bit of a celebratory meal, to mark my latest, very major breakthrough.

The rib-eye steak I brought especially from Amsterdam. I felt very subversive travelling with a planeful of City suits making it for the start of their busy Monday, wearing a sleeveless shirt and carrying a backpack of raw meat: from Moroccan merguez sausages to Dutch runder tartaar extra lean beef mince that I just can't find in London. To bring out the best in the steak, I used a bit of trickery. I marinated it in a mix of:

• freshly ground black pepper,
  
• fish sauce instead of salt,
  
• a wee bit of aceto balsamico bianco (which, thanks to its sugar content, gives that nice golden brown colour tothe steak when you fry it),
• Chinese rice wine (I also had to bring it from Amsterdam because alcohol tax in the UK makes it outrageously expensive for just cooking wine),
• liquid smoke.

Now for frying the steak: you want a really hot skillet, so the meat won't get stewed but seared on the outside while staying pink inside. For that very same reason pat the steak dry with a paper towel before frying. You will also need to use ghee, or pick up the white fluff that comes up when you heat butter - this is to prevent smoking and burning. Ninety seconds on each side and voilà: steak à point!

The salad's pièce de resistance was fried diced parsnips, served with chopped vine tomatoes, sun-dried tomatoes, sliced red onions, lollo rosso, red batavia, apollo, baby leaf spinach, endive, lamb's lettuce and a lot of dill. More than your 5-a-day in just a side dish, how about that! Classic Italian dressing underscored all this natural goodness.