One Flame Cooking Fang Man Style

This evening's meal includes the ultimate bloke-carnivore thing, the flash-fry steak. Sternest Critic likes his still capable of movement, oozing red juices that might put Dracula off, which means about 30 seconds each side on a very hot and minimally oiled pan. My wife and I both go for rare edging towards medium-rare.

Again when in France with just the one Calor Gas burner a small steak was frequently the protein component of an evening meal, some balance provided by carbs from the ubiquitous French stick, veg from the traiteur section of the supermarket - a small tub of celeri-remoulade, Russian or lentil salad or something similar - followed by a cake and some fruit and cheese. So a three/four course meal with only one thing needing heat. With a bit of forethought I'd have a few mushrooms to pop in the pan with the steak, broadening things a bit, or a drained tin (no freezer) of French beans. 

French beans cooked in the leftover meat juices from steak, with a knob of butter and a crushed clove of garlic, is something I'll still do for three of us now, good way to use the jus (a word that like pod people took over without us noticing) and no additional washing up, and it forces me to give the meat a couple of minutes' rest. We have a dishwasher but old habits die hard and the fewer times it runs the better, economically and environmentally.

De Pomiane takes such thinking further in his Cooking in Ten Minutes, dashing off a five course meal in that time, a trick that I'll try every now and then. It's not hard with some thought: starter some slices of salami or a pack of mixed charcuterie and a gherkin or two. Main course steak or lamb chop, both fine underdone though if you get the pan heating when the whistle blows you can have it well done, should you (why?) wish to do so, with said mushrooms or green beans as above; next a small pack of pre-washed salad (I never buy the big ones as they are too much for three people and the remains inevitably wilt and lose their attraction) with any suitable additions available from the fridge like cucumber and red pepper, dressed with my own vinaigrette (bought stuff is stupidly expensive and far too sweet), followed by a simple pud - bought pastry, ice-cream bought or homemade, or virtuously some fruit, with cheese after if we are going the full English route, or before if it's continental that night. You can argue either way and feel free to do so, just don't look down your nose at someone who orders it differently. 

The secret with such a meal is not to have too much of any dish. It's a taste of something and move on when you want to, though you have to time things around the steak.