Beef tataki

BEEF TATAKI

Beef tataki is a Japanese method of preparing beef fillet that involves lightly searing the meat, slicing it thinly like sashimi, and serving it with a citrus-soy dressing. This optimised and delicious recipe includes detailed instructions for making the perfect beef fillet tataki. The technique to perfectly execute this mouth watering beef tataki is to sear it medium rare, instead of regularly done rare searing, and bring the best play of beefy texture in the savoury of the very yuzu truffle dressing with the hint of creamy onion sweetness.

METHODS

Let´s begin by preparing the yuzu truffle dressing;
Burn off the alcohol from the mirin (if you don´t remove the alcohol, the spirit will kill the yuzu truffle aroma), and mix with soy sauce, yuzu juice, lemon juice, and black truffle paste stirring until well combined, and reserve for the serving.
30ml light soy sauce
45ml mirin
30ml yuzu juice
10ml lemon juice
15g black truffle paste

For the onion purée;
Bring oil, onion and garlic in a pan to heat and cook until the ingredients are brown. Add honey, soy sauce, and lemon juice to the pan, remove it from heat once it gets to the boiling and process them to fine purée.

60ml rapeseed oil
1 white onion, finely diced
3 cloves garlic finely diced
10g honey
5ml soy sauce
5ml lemon juice

Preparing the fillet;
Salt fillet liberally with sea salt and allow the salt to sit on the fillet for 12-24 hours in the refrigerator. Place the fillet on a rack on top of a baking sheet for best results to allow the air to flow around the top and bottom of the fillet. Salting basically (dry brining) improves the texture and flavor of the fillet. This will result is an incredibly tender, moist, fillet loaded with flavor.
Now generously season the beef fillet all over with pepper. Bring a cast iron pan over a high heat and allow to heat up until almost smoking. Drizzle over a small amount of oil, then place the fillet into the hot pan and sear all sides evenly.

120g of beef fillet (preferably fillet with infiltrated fat) trimmed
Rapeseed oil
Sea salt
Black pepper

Once the fillet has color on the outside but is still medium rare, remove it from the pan and quickly plunge the beef into an ice bath to halt the cooking process. Leave to chill for a minute, then remove from the ice bath and place on kitchen paper to rest and let drain the water.

SERVING

Thinly slice the seared filled across the grain. Lay the slices on a deep plate, top with onion purée, cream cheese and drizzle with yuzu truffle dressing. Lightly scatter over the spring onion julienne and drizzle with more of the dressing. If your fillet is dry, you can lightly drizzle the tataki with olive oil.