This recipe is my slightly bougie-r take on a a meatloaf and mashed potato dinner. I had some ground beef I needed to use up, and I figured why not make a hamburg steak? Hamburg steak is a Japanese yoshoku-style dish that is basically a beefed up(pun semi-intended here) hamburger patty that is seared and usually served with a nice, rich demi glas-type of sauce. I grew up eating my fair share of hamburg steak, and figured it would be a good template for a quick and easy meal to put together through my work week. For what I wanted to serve with it, that was where I got to have some fun playing my favorite game: “what in Fred’s fridge/pantry needs to be cleaned out?”. I happened to have haricot vert or green beans on hand, so I figured why not use some of those and saute them with soppressata(spicy Italian salami) and bread crumbs, kind of like a pangritata(heavily seasoned bread crumbs, also known as the poor man’s parmesan)? I had a decent amount of soppressata lying around from a leftover charcuterie board, and figured I could sub out some of the bacon I would normally use in my hamburg steak with that instead for an extra kick. For my starch, I have eaten hamburg steak with both rice and mashed potatoes. I decided to go with a fancy mashed potato, or pomme puree, using butter-toasted garlic and truffle sauce to make it a little bit richer. I also went ahead and used a mixture of cooking sake, Worcestershire(I had to Google how to spell the dang thing correctly) sauce, and beef stock to make a pan sauce with the hamburg steak drippings, in lieu of a demi glas! All in all, it was a pretty quick dish to put together, and while it might look like meat loaf and potatoes(which it basically is), there are little nuances here and there, such as the texture of the pangritata, the crispy bits of sopressatta, and the nutty-earthy garlic and truffle notes in the pomme puree) that make it a little nicer than just a frozen Salisbury steak dinner!

For the truffle-garlic pomme puree:
2 tbsp unsalted butter
4 cloves garlic
1/4 tsp dried thyme
1/4 tsp dried oregano
1 tsp truffle salt
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup whole milk
4oz Russet potatoes, peeled and diced

In a pot, start by melting down. the butter with the garlic, thyme, and oregano. To that pan, add in the truffle salt, cream, and whole milk, and keep the pot on low heat, covered. In another pot, boil the potatoes in heavily salted water for 10 minutes, or until a fork can be cleanly removed from one. Pass the potatoes through a ricer. Fold into the potatoes the warmed garlic-truffle cream to finish.

For the sopressata haricot vert:
4 slices soppressata, julienned
3 tbsp panko breadcrumbs
1/4 tsp garlic powder
a pinch of salt
4oz haricot vert, stringy ends trimmed

In a pan, start by rendering out the soppressata until crispy. Remove the soppressata, then add to that the breadcrumbs, garlic powder, and salt. Stir around the ingredients in the pan until the crumbs get toasted and golden-brown in color. In a pot of salted boiling water, blanch the haricot vert for roughly 1 minute. Then shock them in ice water. Pat the haricot vert dry before sauteing them in with the soppressata on low heat, then sprinkling over that the breadcrumbs to finish.

For the hamburg steak:
1/4 cup diced onion
6 pieces soppressata, diced
1 tbsp paprika
1/2 pound ground beef
1/4 cup panko breadcrumbs
1 egg
2 tbsp kewpie mayo
1 tsp soy sauce
1 tsp shio koji

In a pan, sweat out the onion, soppressata, and paprika together on low heat until the onions turn translucent. Mix that with the remaining ingredients to form your hamburg steak mince. Divide up the mixture into 4 portions, and form ovular patties with each piece, pressing a small indent into the middle of each(this will ensure even cooking and reduce shrinkage). Sear the hamburg steaks on one side on medium heat for 3-4 minutes. Then flip the steaks and cook on the other side for another 4-5 minutes. Reserve any drippings in the pan for your pan sauce.

For the pan sauce:
Reserved pan drippings
1 tbsp cooking sake
1 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp cornstarch
1/4 cup beef stock
a pinch of salt

Deglaze the pan first with some cooking sake, scraping the bottom of the pan to remove any of the solids. In a bowl, whisk together the remaining ingredients then pour them into the pan as well, stirring on low heat while allowing the sauce to thicken to the point where it can coat the back of a spoon.