Beef and blue cheese pickups

3
Points®
Total Time
1 hr 20 min
Prep
15 min
Cook
35 min
Serves
12
Difficulty
Easy
Elegant and undeniably flavorful, these steak crostini are a perfect party appetizer or a nice accompaniment for a mealtime salad. If you have a jar of ground fennel seed in your spice drawer, go ahead and use it here. Just know that grinding whole fennel seeds just before using them releases their natural oils to ensure that the most flavor is extracted from the spice. Don’t stir the onions more than about every 5 minutes so that they develop a deep golden hue and lots of sweetness as they caramelize and cook down.

Ingredients

Olive oil cooking spray

3 spray(s)

Olive oil

4 tsp

Uncooked onion

16 oz, (1 onion), white variety, halved and thinly sliced

Table salt

¾ tsp

Fresh thyme

1 tsp, leaves

Whole wheat French bread

8 oz, baguette variety, cut diagonally into 24 (1/4-inch) slices

Uncooked lean flank steak

1 pound(s), trimmed

Fennel seeds

1 tsp, ground using spice grinder or mortar and pestle

Garlic powder

½ tsp

Paprika

½ tsp

Black pepper

¼ tsp

Gorgonzola cheese

1 oz, or blue cheese, crumbled

Instructions

  1. Heat 2 teaspoons of oil in large nonstick skillet over medium heat; add onion and ¼ teaspoon of salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until onion is softened, about 5 minutes. Reduce heat to low and cook onion, stirring occasionally, until light golden, about 20 minutes longer. Transfer to small bowl and stir in thyme; let cool. (Can be made up to 1 day ahead and refrigerated.)
  2. Preheat broiler.
  3. Arrange bread on baking sheet. Lightly spray tops of bread slices with olive oil nonstick spray. Broil 5 inches from heat, without turning, until golden, about 2 minutes.
  4. Rub remaining 2 teaspoons oil all over steak. Mix together fennel, garlic powder, paprika, pepper, and remaining ½ teaspoon salt in cup; rub all over steak.
  5. Spray grill pan with nonstick spray and set over medium heat. Put steak in grill pan and grill until instant-read thermometer inserted into side of steak registers 145°F, about 5 minutes per side. Transfer steak to cutting board; let stand 10 minutes.
  6. To serve, cut steak against grain on slight diagonal into 24 thin slices. Arrange bread, toasted side up, on platter. Top each toast with about 2 teaspoons caramelized onion, 1 slice of steak (folded to fit bread), and few crumbles Gorgonzola.
  7. Per serving: 2 pieces