Tea is one of the oldest ingredients used in the kitchen – and at the same time, one of the newest.
Cooking with tea, is all about bringing this remarkably versatile, healthful, and flavorful ingredient into our food. cooking with tea doesn’t meant that the food will entirely taste as tea, but it will improve the flavors, and add something more.
Cooking with tea, let us looking at it from another way outside the cup. Tea can be used to flavor many savory dishes from appetizers to main dishes, tea has now a wide usage in deserts too.
Sarah from Simply Cooked was our November Daring Cooks’ hostess and she challenged us to create something truly unique in both taste and technique! We learned how to cook using tea with recipes from Tea Cookbook by Tonia George and The New Tea Book by Sara Perry.
This is my first time to cook with tea, many thanks to Sarah for giving us the opportunity. I’m very pleased with the dishes I made using the tea as either one of the ingredient or as a cooking technique, the tea gave an extra flavors to the meat, plus it was a good and a daring step to include it in the salad dressing.
Apple and Cabbage Salad with Lemon Tea Vinaigrette
1 apple cut into quarters, then thinly sliced
red cabbage thinly shredded
1 cup fresh arugula
pecan
for the lemon tea vinaigrette:
2 bags spiced lemon tea
2 tablespoon apple cider
1 tablespoon lemon juice
2 tablespoon olive oil
1\4 teasoppn powdered ginger
1\2 teaspoon sugar
salt and fresh ground black pepper
To make the lemon tea vinaigrette, steep the tea bags in 1\4 cup hot water for 2-3 hours. Whisk together, all the ingredient for vinaigrette with the steeped tea, set aside.
On a salad plate, toss the cabbage, apples slices, and the arugula with the vinaigrette, season with salt and pepper, serve immediately with sprinkle of some pecan on the top.
Beef Rolls with Orange Tea
3 bags spiced orange tea
2 thick cut beef tenderloin
2 tablespoon steak spices (include garlic and pepper)
fresh rosemary
1 tablespoon white vinaigrette
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 green bell pepper,sliced
2 large carrots, cut into slices lengthwise
2 tablespoon tomato paste
1 teaspoon soya sauce
1 tablespoon barbecue sauce
1 teaspoon corn starch
Place the tea bags in 1 cup hot water, let steep for about 2-3 hours.
Meanwhile, slice the tenderloin steak in half lengthwise, the butterfly cut, or not all the way to the end. Place each strip, cut side up, between 2 pieces of plastic wrap and pound with the smooth side of a meat mallet or a heavy saucepan until flattened to about 1/8 inch thick. Season the beef slices with the steak spices, rosemary, white vinaigrette, olive oil, and 1\2 cup of the steeped tea, let marinade for at least an hour in the fridge.
On a large wide sauté pan, heat 1 tablespoon olive oil, add the carrots strips, sauté for 2-3 minutes, then add the pepper slices, sauté for 1 minute.
To prepare rolls, lay a piece of beef on a work surface. Place some of the carrots and bell pepper crosswise on the beef. Roll the beef around the vegetables, support with tooth picks.
Place the roll, seam-side down, on the sauté pan, brown beef rolls over medium heat, turning to brown evenly. Transfer beef to a plate. Add the tomato paste into the pan, sauté for 1 min to give all the flavors of the sweet tomato paste, carefully add the remaining steeped tea, the corn starch, the barbecue sauce, and the soya, beating vigorously with a whisk until sauce is smooth and slightly thickened. Season to taste.
Pour some of the sauce over beef rolls, serve with some mashed potato in the side.
chef_d said:
Both of your dishes look delicious, but the salad is simply amazing! Great job for this month’s challenge!
Good Cooks said:
Thank you Dahlia, you are so welcome.
fati's recipes said:
Oh WOW! 🙂
Yum, all of this looks good, thee rolls are like sushi, but thy’re from meat! 😀 Hehe, that’s so cool… I just wanted to ask you, can I bake them instead? I don’t really like my meat to be pink, I like it well done, so I think baking them can cook through better, right? Do you think I can do that?
I also really love the sauce, sound so tasty! 🙂
Good Cooks said:
Hi Fati, yes they are so good, Fati you can finish it in the oven, where you can check for the meat the way you want it. Hope you like it once you try it, Thanks for dropping by 🙂
Nami | Just One Cookbook said:
I saw another person’s Secret Recipe post earlier… this month’s theme looks really difficult but you did a wonderful job using tea! The beef looks delicious and refreshing salad compliments really well too!
Good Cooks said:
Yes Nami, it was a serious delicious challenge this month, I really enjoy it. Thanks you so much.
Katherine Martinelli said:
Oh wow, I love both of these recipes! Such different but creative uses for cooking with tea! It’s my first time participating in Daring Cooks and I was so happy to take part!
Good Cooks said:
So happy to hear from you Katherine, Thanks so much for stopping by.
Makey-Cakey said:
The red cabbage and apple salad looks fantastic – so zingy and healthy! Definitely a dish that satisfies the eyes as well as the palate
Good Cooks said:
Thank you for your sweet words, happy to see you here 🙂
Heather Mulholland said:
Mmmm I really like the idea of using lemon tea for a vinaigrette and I do have coleslaw in the fridge at home…. yum!
Good Cooks said:
Thank you for dropping by, really appreciated.
Caroline said:
Looks absolutely fantastic! I’d gobble that plate up in no time. Gorgeous photos. x
Good Cooks said:
Hi Caroline, thank you so much for stopping by sweety…
Miss Nirvana said:
I love beef rolls. They remind me of Germany and my family’s cooking. Great job on this challenge.
Good Cooks said:
They are sweet darling, thank you for dropping by 🙂
Sarah (@simplycooked) said:
I love the combination of orange and beef together – what an ingenious idea. And I think your salad is superb. I imagine that by adding both lemon juice and lemon tea the dressing was really tangy. Thank you so much for participating this month!
Good Cooks said:
Many thanks for this delicious challenge Sara, and plenty of ideas we have now for the tea recipes.
Happy to see you here, thanks for dropping by.
tiff or simon said:
looks good will have to try the beef recipe sometime. have you tried cooking with fresh tea leaves? I have yet to find them on sale in th US, but it is tasty as an herb/vegetable.
anh@anhsfoodblog.com said:
Beautiful dishes! I really like the beef one!
Geni - Sweet and Crumby said:
Both of these recipes look yum! I really think the dressing sounds so fabulous and could be used in so many salads.
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Good Cooks said:
Thank you Jami for the related post.