tweet tweet: Thai-style Beef Salad

Are you on Twitter? Who do you follow? And who follows you?

I’m yet to get on the facebook bandwagon (in fact, I think it left the station long ago and I’ll have to wait for the next wagon to come along). But I love Twitter’s immediacy – and brevity. If you’ve got something to say, then just say it in less than 140 chars. Brilliant!

Twitter’s particularly good for catching up on the latest news – what’s ‘trending’, in Twitter-speak – although it can make you feel a bit behind the times when someone you’ve never heard of is getting lots of attention.

I mainly follow other bloggers – food, fashion and craft tweeters, hi there! – but not too many Hollywood or music stars, unless they support good causes and also tweet glamorous photos of A-list events. Restaurant tweeters are a mixed bunch – some of them use social media really well and regularly interact with their clientele, but others have no idea and you can tell that someone’s told them to get on it but really, they act like they’re at a party but are too up themselves to talk to anyone.

Which brings me to today’s recipe. I’ve made this super-simple, extra-delicious salad heaps of times since NZ cooking celeb, @AnnabelLangbein, tweeted it a couple of months ago. She often provides links to fabulous dishes from her own website, and this one is a winner. She has also just produced a new cookbook, so hopefully there will be more of the same on the twitterwaves.

Oh, and a bit of self-promotion: if you don’t already follow me on Twitter, well, shame on you! Try it, you’ll like it – lots of Tabitha cat pics!

Twitter: @OohLookBel

Instagram: @OohLookBel (for even more cat pics!)

Thai-style Beef Salad

serves 2

Ingredients

2 thick sirloin or rump steaks (approx 170-200g per person)

2 tblsp fish sauce

salt and pepper

½ tblsp vegetable oil

2 eschallots or 1 small brown onion, peeled and thinly sliced

1 Lebanese cucumber, peeled, deseeded and cut into small batons

12 cherry or baby grape tomatoes, halved

20 mint leaves, torn in half

½ bunch of chives, cut into 2cm lengths

Dressing:

1/3 cup Thai sweet chilli sauce

1 tblsp fish sauce

Juice and zest of ½ a lime

Method

1. For the steaks: Sprinkle the steaks with fish sauce and salt and pepper. Pour the oil into a large frypan over high heat and cook the steaks for 3 minutes on each side (for medium-rare). Add the eschallots to the pan when you turn the steaks over. When done, remove the steaks from the heat and allow to rest for 5 minutes while you make the salad. Keep the eschallots in the pan with the meat juices.

2. For the dressing: In a small bowl, whisk together the sweet chilli sauce, fish sauce and lime juice and zest.

3. Put the cucumber, tomatoes and mint leaves into a large bowl.

4. Cut the steaks into 1cm-thick slices. Add to the salad bowl with the eschallots and pan juices. Pour over the dressing and top with the chives. Serve.

recipe adapted from annabel-langbein.com

A bowlful of fresh flavours: baby grape tomatoes, eschallot, cucumber, mint and lime.

It's the dressing that really ties this salad together, with the heat of the chilli sauce combining brilliantly with the tang of fish sauce and the tingle of lime.