Braised beef rangoon

Ingredients

• 1lb. beef (any will do really, in this case I used rib eye)
• 2dz. wonton wrapper ( you can find this at your local Asian market, most grocery stores may have this as well)
• 1 red bell pepper
• 2 clove peeled garlic
• 1 yellow onion
• 1tb. crushed red pepper flakes
• 2tb. honey
• 1tsp. kosher salt
• 1 brick cream cheese
• 1tsp. cracked black pepper
• 1 orange to zest and juice
• 1 pint chicken, or beef stock or water
• 2-3tb. olive oil
• 1/2qt. frying oil (vegetable,canola, safflower or any "flavorless frying oil)
• *pre heat oil in deep fryer or heavy duty sauce pot. apx.350f
• **remove beef from your cooler.
• *** pre heat oven to 100f to keep wontons warm.
• ***remove cream cheese from cooler and bring down to temp. (room)

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Preparation

• The sauce. In a sauce pot heat stock or water to a simmer, crush whole garlic and add to pot. This will flavor the liquid. Drizzle in honey and add pepper flake. Let simmer for 20 minutes or so, taste. Adjust sauce if needed, too hot? Add more liquid. Too sweet or not sweet enough add more honey or liquid. Once flavors combine add orange juice and set aside zest. Add zest before serving dish. Zesting, by using a microlane or fine grater zest the fruit gently only grating the the orange peel and NOT the white pith, very bitter.
  
  After zesting the orange set aside. Now cut away the peel. Start by cutting the top and bottom of orange, this provides a more stable product when cutting.
  
  Now carefully slice away peel. Leaving only the "meat" of the fruit.
• OK, carefully cut into a segment of the orange, slicing up against the white pith of the segment. Keep slicing segments of orange until the whole orange has been segmented or "supremed".
  
  Set aside segments and squeeze orange into simmering pot. Let the sauce simmer. Let's start on the beef, by now the beef should have come down in temp. We want this because protein is muscle and when muscle is cold the fibers are close together, when warm the muscle is relaxed thus the fibers relax and allow for better seasoning and more even and quicker cooking. Slice beef to julienne and small dice. Simply take your sliced beef in a small stack, slice beef into strips, from there cut into small cubes or "bruinoise"
• The onion and peppers. We need to cut into small dice or bruinoise. Similar to the orange we cut the top and bottom of onion. Peel off skin. Slice in half. From here, lay onion on the flat side, with your knife carefully slice "horizontally" from the bottom to the top, use the palm of your hand and place it on top of onion when slicing, this helps to secure and prevent injury if your knife slips. From there slice onion vertically, left to right, now you slice down on the onion to produce the dice. your first cut determines the size of the dice, so slice as small as possible. For the pepper it is similar. Cut the top and bottom. Now cut around the core Now that we have cut away the pepper from its core, we can slice carefully off the white "membrane" away from the pepper. Lay slice of pepper skin side down, carefully take a paring knife or if you are comfortable with your knife skills your Chef knife and slice off the membrane of pepper.
  
  When I was in hotels and restaurants this was daily prep for us. The Chef always wanted a "clean" pepper, meaning no white pith or core showing it must be sliced away, you will notice a difference if you eat a slice of pepper BEFORE you "clean" it, it's sweeter when "cleaned" plus this elevates your cuisine and bring your level of cooking higher. Having good knife skills helps in preventing waste and lifts your cuisine to a more refined state. From here we julienne the pepper and then we can cut them into a small dice. Don't forget the top and bottom of your pepper, julienne and dice them as well. Remember waste as little as possible. Set onions and peppers aside.
• Heat on high a saute pan, drizzle olive oil in pan, when just smoking add beef, spread beef evenly, season well and let sear. DO NOT TOUCH. Let the beef get a good sear and develop a nice crust. When beef can be moved easily without sticking to the pan then continue to saute by either tossing the beed or use a cooking utensil to turn beef to saute all sides. You'll notice "steam" rising, the water that is in the beef is evaporating (this why proteins need to come down in temp so that when you begin to cook it won't "steam" itself but saute or grill or whatever means you are cooking the protein. If not then the protein has a "mealy" texture.
  
• In a hot saute pan drizzle the olive oil. When oil is just smoking add the beef, season well. DO NOT TOUCH. let the beef develop a "crust" sear beef well. When beef can be moved around the pan easily then toss or turn beef to saute on all sides. Let it saute, the browning on the bottom of the pan is called the "foundation" or en francais "fond" this is the essence of French cooking. Once the "fond" has developed pour some liquid into the pan just enough to barely cover the beef. Prior to that you'll notice that there is steam rising from the pan, the water in the beef is evaporating (another reason to let protein come down in temp before cooking, if not then the protein is steaming itself thus lending to a grainy or mealy texture. Once most of the liquid has evaporated or has come down to being "au sec" (en francais dry")
  
  Scape your pan with a spoon to pick up the brown bits or the "fond", this develops flavor and "braises" the beef. Braising is two methods of cooking, wet and dry heat. Add your onion and pepper.
  
  Once peppers have become soften slightly remove from heat and allow to cool down a little, in a big bowl place the cream cheese and beef mixture together and combine thouroughly. The wontons, a good way to not go crazy when cooking in batches is prep all wontons prior to frying, clean as you go. You'll need a small bowl of water. Take one wonton, wet the edges with a little water from your fingertips. With a teaspoon scoop a little of the rangoon mix and place in the center of the wonton. Turn the wonton so that the tip is pointed towards you. Gently fold over the wonton and press to seal. Once sealed, gently press on the wonton to spread the mix more evenly. Fry until golden brown on both side, you may need to flip the wonton over in the oil to achieve this. Make sure that you have a place to put the finished wonton to dry off any excess oil. Place in warm oven while you finish frying the rest of your wontons.
• Serving, place sauce in a separate bowl or vessel of your choosing and add orange zest to the sauce, place wontons on platter or whatever presentation plate you wish.

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