Grilled Rib Steak & Refried Rice Using Grilled Rib Steak Left Overs

While much of the discussion on this blog throughout the past week focused on my adventures in making no knead breads, it has been a whirlwind of activity here.  We decided to makeover the master bedroom completely including new furniture and at the same time finish the guest room.  The furniture (Vaughan-Bassett) for the master bedroom had an estimated time of arrival of three weeks giving me plenty of time to shop for accessories and work on the crochet bedspreads for each room.  The bedspreads are a huge undertaking given one is king and the other queen size, so a lot of work.  Shopping for accessories meant several shopping trips with many foodie stops!  Much of the focus was stocking up on herbal teas, K-cups, various flours and cherry picking the sales.  I did manage to find a few interesting foods to try so will talk about them as they are used.  Oh, and I just couldn't resist the cute salt and pepper shakers in just the perfect deep red for the kitchen, a new tea ball and a couple of kitchen organizers.  At the same time, I was experimenting with the no knead breads and testing the 4ever Recap canning lids.  Even though it has been rather busy, regular cooking continued.

It has been a cold, wet spring with wet snow a couple of days ago and frost on the roofs yesterday morning.  Still, we have been doing more grilling.  The deck off the kitchen is quite protected from the winds making it perfect for grilling in all but the most unpleasant weather.   Early this week the sun made a rare appearance so I thawed a couple of rib steaks for grilling.  The steaks were grilled to medium rare, served with baked potatoes and steamed broccoli.  It was a delicious meal! 

We seldom marinate or use barbeque sauce on our steaks.  Instead, we let the flavour of the gorgeous, hormone free beef shine!  I love baked potatoes baked in the oven but just can't wait to start baking them on the grill again.  The grill gives a bit of extra flavour yet keeps the skin crispy and flesh tender. 

All of the steaks from our beef on the hoof purchase are large, cut to our specifications of 1 - inch thick.  While the whole steak looks luscious for the photo shoot, it is too much steak for either of us although if my husband is in the right mood, occasionally he will polish off a steak this big.  At any rate, anytime we have steak for dinner we have left overs.  Although steak does reheat nicely to enjoy as is, I also use left-over steak in other dishes.

The following day, I cooked rice for dinner which is so nice now that I've mastered cooking it on the stovetop.  The rice comes out perfect every time, something I attribute to the gas burners that are considerably easier to control than electric burners that retain residual heat after being turned off.  I used the rice to make refried rice.

Refried rice is an extremely easy and inexpensive way to use left over rice and beef, chicken or pork that can be made in 15 minutes or less.  It uses soy sauce which is incredibly high in sodium content.  Even the low sodium soy sauces have over 500 mg of sodium in 1 tbsp!  I use Rooster Brand Dark Soy Sauce which has 800 mg of sodium per 1 tbsp but because it has a deeper, richer flavour, less is needed.  It does give a darker colour to any dishes it is used in. Neither of us are on a sodium restricted diet however, we do tend to eat fairly low sodium so refried rice is a dish we enjoy only a very few times a year.

Method:  Cook rice or use left over rice.  I used 3 cups of cooked rice.  Cut left over steak (chicken or pork) into strips or pieces.  Heat a little olive oil in a non-stick skillet.  Pour in the rice.  Stir in about 1½ tbsp dark soy sauce, mixing well.  Stir in prepared meat and about 1 c of frozen peas.  Mix.  Make a well in the centre of the rice.  Pour in three beaten eggs.  Stir and continue stirring while incorporating the rice mixture into the eggs as they cook.