My Continued Efforts to Cook Meat Without Making Myself Sick

Welcome to Better Than It Looks, a series in which we discuss the recipes we tried (and maybe failed) to execute, and the foods that were served to us by someone perhaps more talented than ourselves. This week: two different adventures with meat.

Ok, just to get this out of the way, I don’t really make a habit out of undercooking meat and sickening myself. To be honest, I can’t remember ever actually doing this. That’s largely because I’m so paranoid about making myself sick that I’ll overcook something just to be sure.

This is relevant because this week I bought a ton of brussels sprouts and needed some sort of protein to go with them.

The first attempt was with this recipe for (gluten-free and paleo!) crispy chicken legs and brussels sprouts from So…Let’s Hang Out. After a period of ignoring my doctor and assuming I’d be fine, I’m back to heavily cutting back on my carbohydrates intake to make sure I don’t give myself diabetes. Apparently my body is just very sensitive to carbs and sugar AKA everything that tastes good.

My grocery store didn’t have whole chicken legs, which is probably for the best because bones stress me out. Instead I got some organic skinless chicken thighs because they were on sale and there. With this cut of meat I probably should have used a bit less chicken stock but I did not. The initial result was wet sprouts which is the worst. But I threw those babies back in the oven, broiled them for a bit and got them crispy like I like them.

The above, well-lit image is what the dish was supposed to look like.

I highly recommend this recipe. It called for lots of powdered garlic which is always great and the chicken stock gave the brussels sprouts a richer flavor. I forgot about the parmesan cheese. [Editor’s Note: Literally how?!]

I had some brussels sprouts leftover because I never use a scale at the grocery store and therefore always end up with extra vegetables, so I grabbed a strip steak on my second visit to the grocery store. I don’t usually cook red meat myself because I’m a lush who prefers filets and I don’t want to waste $15 on a single piece of meat that I’ll probably ruin.

My cast iron skillet was again put to use for my steak preparation. Bravely, I simply cut a small hole to check the doneness of the meat and then let it rest, hoping it would warm up to a medium preparation. It did. I have triumphed.

I enjoyed my steak with about half a bottle of this Blason de Bourgogne Brut Réserve that I found at Trader Joe’s. I have to believe that this is the best $10 bottle of “champagne” in existence. Seriously, this stuff is amazing and it’s probably all I’m going to drink from now on.

For the record, I did not get sick after eating either meat dish. I have also ordered a meat thermometer.