Tomahawk steak and the Year of the rat
Dedicated to the water rats of Belconnen, Canberra.
Mmm… water rat
Happy Chinese New Year or Happy Lunar New Year. It’s the year of the rat and I’m a rat according to the Chinese Zodiac.
Warning
Wide ranging blog post
This post covers a broad range of my thoughts from eating water rats to hand to hand combat with a cane knife.
Read on if you like or skip to the recipe.
Water rats
I live in the Belconnen town centre of Canberra and the artificial lake close by, viz., Lake Ginninderra is replete with water rats. I’ve seen them swimming around especially in the more polluted parts of the lake. I’m guessing water rats can make good eating when skinned, gutted, and cooked. Sadly for my Chinese New Year dinner water rat was not on the menu.
More than 30 cm long
Hydromyini chrysogaster also known as rakali or rabe is a Australian native rodent and male water rats can grow longer than 30 cm (more than a foot in the old language). That’s a lot of rat to eat.
Since a water rat is off the menu due to my lack of motivation to trap, kill, and process one for dinner, I bought a steak from Coles.
Tomahawk steak again
Coles is selling this steak as a so-called Tomahawk steak. I’m not sure about this. I’ve written about my idea of a Tomahawk steak before and I think the rib needs to be longer. From the photographs and drawings I’ve seen of tomahawks from North America the handles tend to be longer. Not as long as a traditional axe, but longer than what Coles is purporting to be a Tomahawk steak.
Coles, why not a more Australian context?
I think it’s a bit disappointing that Coles has gone with the Tomahawk terminology rather than something more familiar with Australians, especially older Australians, and especially the best Australians, i.e., Queenslanders.
I’m talking about the cane knife. The cane knife is every bit as useful as a tomahawk as a fighting weapon as well as being fit for purpose to cut sugar cane. While I’m no knife throwing expert, I wonder if a cane knife can also be better weighted than the head heavy tomahawk.
Bundaberg
My grandfather and his brothers owned and ran sugar cane farms in Bundaberg, Queensland and as I was growing up I grew familiar with a cane knife for backyard gardening. A sharp cane knife is a beautiful thing. I can imagine slicing someone’s head off or taking off an arm or a leg similar to how a machete might be used in combat. A vertical strike to the top of the head would probably split a head in two like a coconut.
I’m not suggesting for a second that the cane knife is Australian, it’s not. It’s used all around the world, but it’s definitely used in Australia.
Yummy Lummy is not sponsored by anyone.
Recipe
- Long Bone in rib steak
- Iodised salt
- Black pepper
- Butter
- Queensland nut oil
- Mushrooms
- Queensland nut oil
- White onion
- Butter
- Cream
- Cooking sherry
- Frozen peas and corn
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Unwrap the steak from the plastic cryovac wrapping.
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Dry the steak with absorbent kitchen paper.
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Season the steak with iodised salt and freshly cracked black pepper.
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Place the seasoned steak on a rack over a tray and refrigerate uncovered to allow the surface to dry out further while the salt is absorbed deeper.
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When ready to cook, heat up a large frypan and turn an oven on to 200 °C (392 °F).
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Rub Queensland nut oil over the steak and begin to sear the surfaces in the hot frypan.
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Once seared, insert a meat thermometer and with the steak on a rack over a baking tray put it into the hot oven.
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Cook until the middle of the steak reaches about 57 °C (134 °F).
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Allow the steak to rest for about 10 minutes.
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With a boning knife slice the meat from the rib.
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Dissect the longissimus muscle (fillet) from the spinalis dorsi muscle (deckle) and put the fillet into a container and refrigerate.
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With a sharp butchers knife slice the deckle and expose the beautiful pink red juicy fatty and meaty deckle in all its glory.
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In a hot frypan squirt some Queensland nut oil and add a knob of butter allowing the butter to melt and foam.
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Add in a sliced onion and turn the heat down.
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Splash in some cooking sherry and put a lid on the frypan until the onion is soft and caramelised.
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When the onion is soft and dark remove it to a bowl.
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In the frypan add the diced mushroom pieces and a good splash of cooking sherry.
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Add the lid to the frypan and cook until the mushrooms shrink and release the cellular water.
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Remove the lid and add the cooked onion and reduce the mushroom water until it has evaporated.
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Add in some cream and cook until a sauce is formed.
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Remove the creamy onion and mushroom sauce into a bowl and add a cup of frozen peas and corn to the frypan.
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Add a splash of water and cook the peas and corn until soft.
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Drain off any extra water.
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Plate the green and gold vegetables to a dinner plate.
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Add the creamy onion and mushrooms next to the green and gold vegetables.
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Lay the slices of steak over the onion and mushrooms.
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Shoot a photograph and a short video because Google now wants video on recipe cards.
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Eat the meal.
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Wash the dishes (hint, wash as you cook, it makes life easier).
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Write the recipe.
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Write the blog post.
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Hit publish and hope this blog post gets shared on Twitter, Facebook, and Pinterest.
Disclaimer
I have no culinary training nor qualifications. This post is not intended to convey any health or medical advice. If you have any health concerns about anything you read, please contact your registered medical practitioner. The quantities are indicative. Feel free to vary the quantities to suit your taste. I deliberately do not calculate energy for dishes. I deliberately default to 500 Calories or 500,000 calories because I do not make these calculations.
Photographs
This is a gallery of photographs. Click on one image and then scroll through the photographs.
Questions and answers
What does Chinese New Year mean to you?
Nothing really. I’m a basian. A bad Asian. That’s why I’m eating a Tomahawk steak.
Would you really eat a water rat?
Sure, why not. I’d pretend to be Shrek and cook it rotisserie style. Maybe not as good as a Tomahawk steak though.
What’s the significance of the green and gold vegetables?
Green and gold are the sporting colours of Australia. Tomorrow, 26 January, is a day many Australians observe as a day to remember when the British first colonised the island.
Some Australians object and regard the colonisation as an invasion of land occupied by Indigenous Australians who had travelled to the Great Southern Land thousands of years before.
Depending on the interpretation of the archeological records they could have usurped another group of sapiens and undertaken the systematic consumption of all the megafauna leaving only the marsupial fauna we know today.
Yummy Lummy is hardly the place to debate the humanoid inhabitation of the Great Southern Land by groups of sapiens.
The Tomahawk steak cannot claim an origin here though.
Final thoughts
- Do you celebrate Chinese or Lunar New Year?
- Would you eat a water rat?
- Would you prefer a cane knife steak or a tomahawk steak?
Sponsorship
Yummy Lummy has no sponsors but maintaining a blog isn’t free. If anyone or any company would like to contribute please contact me.
your food not only looks delicious. it is the best diet to kill cancer cells.
Thank you
The steak and the vegetables look very tasty and colorful together. Cheers!
Thank you very much
I’m the year of the rat too! I used to think that it was bad to be a rat but they apparently have good qualities too. Not sure how I’d feel about coming across a 30cm rat!
I like to think we’re survivors and tenacious Lorraine. Very good qualities 😃
Happy New Year! 🎏🎎🌟
Thank you very much Gail.
Your dinner looks delicious Gary and I think, that this bone was from a calf, not so big as a cow, but mostly more tender and easy to cook.
I would not eat rats at all, as they carry many illnesses from where they live. I don’t need any of those infections at all.
Thanks Irene. I’d eat a rat but only if it was cooked thoroughly. I’d probably cook it with steam under pressure in an autoclave. I’d then brown the skin.
‘Hatchet’ Steak would be familiar to everyone, I should think.
Haha, yes, I agree.