In my book - that's right - in Carolyn Dizon's "book," Harold Dieterle is a Top Chef god. I was SO excited to make this recipe. I knew it would be like heaven, but with steaks and foie gras and parsnips. All, yummy, all the time! Well, perhaps you know where this is going, so let me just say this: Every one of my guests LOVED this meal. LOVED it. LOVED everything about it. Me? I wanted a little more out of this dish. I expected more. So, let me just cut to the chase, I'll explain more later - this is not a recipe for strip steaks. This is a recipe for fillet mignon. Fillet mignon would have had five people, not just four loving every aspect of this dinner.

Choosing the Steak:
Well, I already gave away my view on using strip steaks in this recipe, and I'll explain why later, but if you want to follow the recipe to the letter and use strip steaks, I highly recommend buying steaks that are bigger than just 10 to 12 ounces each. Steaks that were 10 to 12 ounces each were just too thin. You need a thicker steak for this recipe so that they don't become over done. Still, as with buying any steak, do yourself a favor and get the butcher to cut them fresh for you and have him trim truly excessive fat.