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Comfort Food, pt. 4

I will admit to being a huge fan of home-made fried chicken. Hot or cold, the stuff is good. As good as it is, I much prefer home-made Chicken Fried Steak or CFS for short. In fact, I never order CFS at a restaurant. My mother has made CFS as far back as I can remember. And, if I had my choice, I would choose her's over just about anyone's.

The origins of CFS are lost to us, although the recipe for various southern versions of county fried steak can be found in recipe books going back almost 200 years. In Texas, and I think CFS is a Texas cuisine, the dish is a combination of a number of things.

First, dredging beef in flour and frying it was common in the antebellum south. As Anglos moved west into Texas, this dish may have come with them. In Texas, however, the Germans brought with them one of their favorite dishes from deutschland: wiener schnitzel, which is a veal cutlet dredged in flour, eggs and breadcrumbs and then fried. Veal never caught on well in Texas, at least not like beef. Then came the cattle drives, where chuck wagon cooking developed into an art form. Beef was plentiful, obviously, and the cooks learned to use just about every part of cow. It didn't take long to learn that if you took a rough piece of meat and beat it silly until it was thin as paper, dredge it flour and fry it, then that meat would taste better. Later, when God created canned milk, this was added to the mixture on the cattle drives, and something resembling what we know as CFS was born. By the way, Lamesa, TX claims to be the birthplace of CFS.

So, here are some thing's I've learned from cooking CFS. First, if you don't have a cast iron skillet, go out to eat. Secondly, go ahead and use those "less preferred" cuts of meat rather than strips, rib eyes or sirloins. You don't need to bread and fry those cuts to make them tasty, and you don't add anything to them by using them for CFS. Third, have your butcher tenderize the meat for you, then take it home, get out a hammer or meat tenderizer, and beat that meat until it is about the size of a hubcap. Finally, use Crisco only to fry the steak in your iron skillet. Never deep fry CFS, it should be pan fried, with the oil coming up on the sides, but not covering the top.

I have heard many recipes for CFS, and they are all wonderful. Using buttermilk is fine, but that seems to taste better with chicken, in my opinion. I've even seen some people use condensed milk instead of regular milk. I have developed a taste for a milk-less breading. Try marinating your meat in the left-over pickling liquid after you finish a jar of jalapenos. Then substitute the liquid for milk and make CFS like you normally would. It isn't too hot, and you get just a hint of the twang from the vinegar. Delicious.

So, send me your thoughts about the greatness of CFS along with your recipes.

Comments

It's interesting how you combine the German influence with the Southern cooking - I think you're onto something! Jalapeno flavor? Hmmm. Sounds interesting, but with all the mess to clean up after frying any food, I think I'll probably stick to the old way.....not that I'm planning to do that, either.

The only way I use floured steak anymore is to make Swiss steak, and I've grown to love that.

I enjoy your thoughts in this blog, and now I know you're one of those men who like to cook!! Good going!

Anna H

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