Rockpool’s Cafe de Paris Butter for Steaks

The secret to a good Cafe De Paris Butter, lies in quality butter and a perfect balance of fragrant herbs and curry powder. The following recipe is not just any loose interpretation of the sauce, it is inspired by one of Australia’s best, Neil Perry of Rockpool Bar and Grill. For homemade cultured butter see this post.

I would be kidding myself, and you, if I told you that this post was about beef steaks. It’s all about the butter!

What is Cafe de Paris Butter?

Cafe de Paris Butter is a mixture of butter, herbs, spices, other condiments such as mustard, capers and Worcestershire sauce to name a few. Freeze the butter in a log and cut it off as you need it which is always a bonus!

Having tried Neil Perry’s Cafe de Paris Butter recently I couldn’t think about anything else for about a week. This should give you an indication of how good this butter was. I was going to reverse engineer the recipe, because I like to do that when I’ve tasted something magnificent. A quick search brought me to Neil’s recipe. It has a lovely hint of curry. I’m just spreading the love.

What to serve it with?

Recipes for the butter vary slightly. But, it’s always served as a little coin-sized round on top of hot beef steak. You could also try it with lamb steaks or game meats.

While this time we opted for premium Rangers Valley 300 day rumps (at $69 a kilo), a similar memorable-for-weeks-type effect could easily be achieved with your regular supermarket beef fillet. It’s all in the butter…

If you’d gasped at the price of the beef, I assure you that one $22 steak, was more than enough to satisfy 3 people. We simply asked the butchers at Victor Churchill to split the 300g steak into three.

The 100g serving can be easily padded out with cheap peasant vegetables. Humble potato mash, roasted beets, onion and parsnip, as well steamed green veg.

In the end, the meal ends up being relatively easy to prepare at home. And tastes incredibly good!

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3.66 from 23 votes

Rockpool's Cafe de Paris Butter Sauce Recipe for Steaks

It's one of those recipes that looks scary because of the long ingredient list, but it's not only quick and simple to prepare, the butter can be frozen and tastes absolutely sensational! You could use it with beef roasts, grilled salmon or even chicken. Prepare in advance. Also, I like to melt my butter portions in the microwave just before serving, for say about 15 seconds, as it helps the flavours 'melt' into the steaks. Adapted slightly from Neil Perry's recipe.

Prep Time10 minutes mins

Cook Time5 minutes mins

Total Time15 minutes mins

Servings: 8 -10

Ingredients

• 3 tsp light tasting olive oil
• 1/4 small brown onion finely diced
• 10 g Indian style curry powder
• 125 g unsalted butter softened
• 1 small handful parsley leaves
• 1 clove garlic crushed
• Juice of 1/2 lemon
• 2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
• 3 anchovy fillets
• 1/2 tsp baby capers rinsed
• 1/2 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp ground pepper
• 1 small handful basil leaves
• 1 leaves small handful thyme sprigs only
• 1/2 tsp ground ginger
• 1 egg yolk

Instructions

• Heat the oil in a frying pan and cook the onion and curry powder over low heat until soft and fragrant. Set aside to cool.
• Place cooled cooked onion and all remaining ingredients in a food processor or a chopping attachment of your sick blender and process until well combined and majority of the herbs have been blended into the butter. Adjust the seasoning if necessary.
• Roll Cafe de Paris Butter into a 2 inch diameter log, wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm. Any unused butter can be frozen if it is not going to be used within a week or so.
• To serve, slice Cafe de Paris Butter into rounds (and bring to room temperature) before serving on top of hot steaks. Allow the butter to melt into a sauce.

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