Beef + Bacon = 1 Happy Husband

Rib Steak

When it comes to beef, The Big Guy prefers a manly-man rib steak. He likes that rich marbling that guarantees its juiciness. But then you know how it is, you get to be a certain age and the old doctor says to lay off the fat, cut down on red meat, and eat leaner cuts, blah, blah, blah. Being the loving wife that I am, I start pulling the tenderloins instead of the rib steaks, out of the freezer. Six little ounces of nothing but lean, red meat with barely even a hint of marbling. “Girl steak,” Big says, and I can tell he’s not too crazy about it. “Doctors orders,” I say.

Tenderloin Steaks

     Then I decide I’ll spunk it up a little for him. Hmmm, bacon wrapped + tenderloin = boring, but yet bacon + beef = a match made in heaven. Come to think of it bacon + anything = bliss. Then it hits me, I’ll make a Bacon-Shallot Butter to top off that little hunka hunka burnin meat.

     What? You say I’m defeating the purpose if I take a lean cut of meat and add the fat right back in? Bacon + Butter = Heart attack to the tenth power, you say? I did the math and it works out like this: we ditched 6 oz. of highly marbled juicy rib steak, or approximately 400-500 calories, and a good 20-30 grams of fat, in exchange for 1 little ole tablespoon of butter and about the equivalent of a half a piece of bacon, a measly half a piece of bacon people, or about 125 calories and 10 grams of fat…total for butter + bacon. Here’s how it calculates out…Bacon + Butter – Rib Steak = negative 18.0276 squared calories. So I figured I was way ahead of the game, saving hubby at least 1.5 heart attacks about every 4.8 years, or if you are using the metric system, that's about $298,420 dollars per fiscal year.   

The steak, just before I popped it under the broiler

     But whoa just a sec…When The Big Guy added that second piece of Bacon-Shallot Butter to the girl steak, I had to recalculate…Tenderloin + Bacon Butter to the second power = Happy Husband. If you are still using that old fashioned metric system it works out like this:  he could have had the rib streak.

The steak, 45 seconds later

I served some steamed potatoes on the side, which The Big Guy topped with...you guessed it, a piece of the Bacon-Shallot Butter, proving that yes indeed, bacon and butter go on everything. (Note-since this was a highly technical mathematic experiment, I made the Bacon-Shallot Butter two ways; one with bread crumbs added to the butter mixture and one without. I preferred it with the crumbs, while Big preferred it without. Add 20 calories +/- and increase the heart attack/year ratio by a .314 +/-divided by 7.286, if you add the bread crumbs, or just add about $.022 per serving.) Go to the "Beef-Pork-Chicken" tab at the top of this page to view it.