I love side dishes. Sometimes I could just eat an entire meal of side dishes. When it’s the holidays, side dishes are pretty much all I eat. They are my favorite.
I love making them, I love eating them and most of all I looooove having them as leftovers.
The other night I tried out new side dish and it was off the hook. I was trying to be all romantical and make my husband a homemade steakhouse-type dinner: clam chowder, wedge salad, surf & turf and creamed spinach. I know, I’m fancy.
Now, I never really enjoyed creamed spinach, but since it is one of my husbands favorites, I felt compelled to make it with the meal on Valentine’s day. Well now I’m obsessed. It was soooo good. Adding this to my list of favorite side dishes. It was a little tedious to make, but totally worth it.
Steakhouse Worthy Creamed Spinach
creamed spinach…thats not $10 a serving.
- 2 bags of spinach
- 1/4 cup diced onion
- 1/4 cup all purpose flour
- 6 TBS butter
- 1 bay leaf
- dash of nutmeg
- 2 cups of whole milk
Begin by cooking the 2 bags of spinach in some water. Wilting should take about 2 minutes. Drain and place in a bowl of ice water to cool. Once cool, squeeze the liquid out of the spinach with a towel. Get as much liquid out as you can. Then chop the spinach as much as you can. You can also put the spinach in a food chopper or food processor to finely chop it. Reserve for later.
Melt 4 tablespoons of butter in a medium size pan over medium heat. Once the butter is melted, stir in 1/4 cup of flour and continue to stir until it is a light brown color. Approximately 7 minutes. Then add the onion, bay leaf and nutmeg.
Once combine, gradually whisk in the 2 cups of milk. Continue to whisk until the mixture thickens – approximately 10 minutes. Reduce heat to low and simmer for 5 minutes longer, whisking frequently. Remove the bay leaf.
Add spinach to the cream mixture and mix well. Simmer over low heat, stirring frequently until the spinach is heated – about 5 more minutes. Stir in the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
Serve!
You will feel like you are in one of those over-priced steak joints. Pair it with a nice steak, some chicken or even a meal of sides – you won’t be disappointed!
– Amanda
FYI: I will be posting more recipes from my homemade Steakhouse dinner next week!
