So, how's the Pre-Christmas season treating you? How have you been?

Have you ever been to the "Forbidden Forest" in winter? No? Well, don't, because it's always forbidden, as its name says. While you will encounter some friendly creatures, you will also be faced with some difficult ones and some outright unfriendly ones. 

If you are really on the boat to the "Forbidden Forest" , remember to have spells in your repertoire, your Care of Magical Creatures, Herbology, Astronomy, and Defense Against the Dark Arts lessons in mind, and ensure that you are only going with a Professor.

However, food on the table with juicy elements in your dish will keep your eyes rolling and your stomach grumbling. Prepare for a lip-smacking Christmas feast with my "The Forbidden Forest" Steak recipe. Immerse your taste buds and those of your relatives in the natural, umami, and earthy flavors of "The Forbidden Forest" , for your grandest Christmas feast yet.

Here I am again, Hiya, the compiler, publisher, editor, and journalist of the magazine, to help you cook for Christmas.

How would you bring the "Forbidden Forest" onto a plate? Take this journey with me into the forest to create this beautiful Christmas dish with a forest-y and earthy flavor profile. It consists of a steak on a bed of sautéed onions and baby bella mushrooms, with rounded potatoes, sautéed greens, and apple-cranberry sauce as sides.

First of all, we encounter a log in the middle of our path through the forest. 

Looking closely, it's only a prime rib or rib-eye roast steak, so we gobble it up.

To make the rib-eye steak, we need (serves 12): - 

Rib-eye roast - 13 pounds.

Kosher salt - 2 teaspoons and more for seasoning.

Dijon mustard - 1/3rd cup.

Minced garlic - 2 tablespoons.

Chopped thyme leaves - 1 tablespoon.

Coarsely ground black pepper - 1 teaspoon.

Extra-virgin olive oil - 3 tablespoons.

The process: -

Leave your rib-eye roast at room temperature for 1 hour. Preheat the oven to 450°F. Place the meat, bone side down, in a roasting pan. Season lightly with Kosher salt. Roast for 20 minutes. Bring the temperature down to 350°F.

In a bowl, mix the mustard, garlic, thyme, pepper, and two teaspoons of Kosher salt. Whisk in 3 tablespoons of olive oil.

Brush this mixture all over the meat, covering the top and sides. Roast for 1 and 1/2 hours. Keep turning the pan during roasting to ensure even browning on all sides.

We need a medium roast because it will have brown edges and a pink center, and will most resemble the log of wood we want. So, we will cook the meat until the temperature of the thickest part on an instant thermometer is 130°F. However, if you want it medium-rare, cook until the temperature of the thickest part is 120°F.

Cover the roast loosely with foil and leave it for 20-30 minutes. Carve your roast however you like. Whatever juices come out while carving, spoon them back on top of the steak.

Our steak is ready. Now, we put it on the center of our plate, but wait? What about the "Forbidden Forest" soil? It's a muddy-earthy brown, from what I remember.

So, I take a skillet and sauté some mushrooms in salt and my favorite seasonings (usually pepper) until they are browned. I use perfectly thin slices of cremini mushrooms, also known as baby bellas. Shiitake mushrooms would work as well. Simultaneously, in a frying pan, I sauté onions in salt until brown. I rub some olive oil on the plate to yellow it, then cover the plate with browned onions and thinly sliced sautéed brown mushrooms. You can cut the onions into rings, slice them into any thin shape, as long as they look good on the plate and make you think of a good ground for the "Forbidden Forest" . (Of course, sauté the onions after cutting, not the other way around. : D).

Place the steak on top. There is a log of wood on our plate, on the soil. How about adding some rocks? The "Forbidden Forest" surely has enough rocks to make you stumble and fall. So let's make some rounded potatoes to be worried about instead.

Brown some rounded potatoes, halved, in the oven. Burn them slightly to give them a few black edges, and place them around the roast. There, the path in the "Forbidden Forest" is quite rocky.

There ought to be some trees in the "Forbidden Forest" , however small, even if the log we encountered on the path was of a gigantic size (maybe it was enchanted, after all). So, throw in some broccoli and whatever greens you like, to plant some trees in the forest and find some fallen leaves (for effect, microgreens will do the job). 

It looks like someone spilled blood in the "Forbidden Forest" . Wait, don't give me a scare. A log in the "Forbidden Forest" smeared with blood? But that's apple-cranberry sauce spread on the steak.

How do I spill red paint on the log?

To cook some apple-cranberry sauce, we need: -

Fresh cranberries (discard any soft or brown cranberries) - 3 cups.

Sugar - 1 and 1/4 cups.

Water - 2 cups.

Apple - 1.

Orange rind - 1/2.

Orange juice - from 1/2 an orange.

Ground cinnamon - 1/2 teaspoon.

Ground cloves - 1/4 teaspoon.

The process of cooking the sauce: -

Boil the orange rind in the water to get orange-infused water. Strain the water to remove the orange peels.

Dice the apple into 1/2-inch cubes after coring and peeling. 

In a bowl, add cranberries, orange-infused water, apple cubes, orange juice, sugar, cinnamon, and cloves. Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat, cover loosely, and simmer gently, while stirring occasionally. The apples will turn tender, the cranberries will burst, and the sauce will thicken. It will take 10-15 minutes. Bring to room temperature and pour over the steak to make it look like blood.

There's something red and congealed on the log on our path. But I am sure that's part of an edible feast, too.

If you cook the steak first, you risk serving it cold because it will take some time to arrange the other things that should go on the plate. Cook the apple-cranberry sauce earlier, and then the steak. Or keep cooking the sides while the steak is still in the oven (keep an eye on your rib-eye when in the oven, though).

That's quite the scene in the "Forbidden Forest" . Hiya assures you that it is not only a feast for your eyes but also a treat for your taste-buds. So, get sculpting the "Forbidden Forest" with your own hands and prime the taste buds of your guests and yourself to prepare for your grandest Christmas feast yet.

Sources : - https://saltsugarspice.com/2019/11/08/cranberry-sauce-with-apples-and-orange-zest/

https://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/standing-rib-roast-beef

- Hiya Debnath, Journalist, Compiler, Publisher, Editor, Hogwarts Monthly Magazine.