Holy Crap. That Was Too Much Food.

Hi all, this is Pat Deering, bringing you a special guest entry here on Culinary Conquistadors. With Matty off in places unknown, Luke asked me to do a special appearance and I jumped at the offer.

Anyways, tonight, after a frantic trip to a closed Heinen's and a confusing Giant Eagle, we prepared a pesto and farfalle dish, a Layonnaise potato variation, and a classic marinated bottom round steak (hey, they were buy one get one free). I also recommend picking up a Heineken draught keg like we did. They rock.

First off, is the pesto sauce for the farfalle. Cook your farfalle, put it in a bowl, and then put it in the fridge so it cools. This is critical, as the extra virgin olive oil and basil you'll be heaping on it might lose its flavor in heat. Then, take a handful of basil leaves, 5-7 crushed garlic cloves, extra virgin olive oil, some pine nuts, and a handful of parmesan cheese, and blend them till its smooth. (It will look like snot, don't worry). For better flavor, toast the pine nuts in a pan on medium heat real quick first. Set aside.

As this is going on, you'll want to be boiling your potatoes. Any variety except Idaho bakers should work. In another pan, sautee some onion in butter with a little Lowry's salt, and set aside.

While the potatoes are boiling, marinade your steaks (buy top round, and don't be poor college students like us). We used a Montreal seasoning, some oil, water, and red wine vinegar to prepare ours. Set in a fridge till you're ready to grill.

When the potatoes are ready (fork tender) mash them (skins still on) together with some more butter, a tiny bit of milk, and the onions from before, and then set aside. Have someone throw your steaks on the grill, and then get that farfalle out of the fridge. Toss it with the pesto, some red and yellow peppers, and some black olives (we wanted to add mushrooms too, but the only ones we could find were in the bottom drawer of Lukas's fridge and smelled a bit like DEATH. So we opted out). Any veggies will work honestly, but the black, yellow, and red colors gave a nice contrast to the white pasta and green pesto.

Don't forget about the steaks! I recommend RARE, which is what we had, but if you insist on murdering your meat, you can always go medium rare.

At this point in time, everything should be just about ready. Plate it up, and serve. We of course, made the mistake of make an 8 person box of farfalle, huge 24oz steaks, and enough potatoes to make an Irish man cry. We don't recommend doing that, as now all of us are falling into dangerous food comas.

For now though, Margarita time!