Salisbury Steak — The Kind of Meal That Shows Up at Your Door

Nine weeks. That's what it's been, though I've stopped counting by days because counting by days makes each one feel like a sentence being served. Nine weeks since March third, and the stove hasn't been on once. The church ladies have a rotation—Sister Yvette on Mondays, Sister Dorothy on Wednesdays, Sister Louise on Fridays—and they leave food at the front door, ring the bell, and walk away before I have to open it and find words. I don't have words right now. I have something that sits where words used to be, something thick and geological, and when I open my mouth it doesn't come out as language.

The food goes into the refrigerator. Some of it I eat, standing at the counter, not tasting it. Some of it Calvin eats over his theology books. He has surrounded himself with books—commentaries, systematic theologies, volumes by church fathers I recognize and scholars I don't—and he is searching for God's purpose in what happened the way a man searches his pockets for something he already knows isn't there. I don't have the heart to tell him the books won't have it either. Let him look. Looking is at least a direction.

The windows have been closed. The neighbors grilled last Saturday—I could smell it, the charcoal and the meat, and the smell came through the kitchen window like a stranger walking into the house, and I got up and closed every window in the back of the house and sat down again. Not because I was cold. Because food being cooked without me feels like a language being spoken in my home that I no longer understand. I built my whole life in that language. Bernice taught it to me when I was six years old, standing beside her in the church kitchen in Bessemer, and I have spoken it every day since, and now I can't. The tongue doesn't work. The translation is gone.

Destiny calls every other day from Birmingham. She's finishing up her junior year at UAB, somehow holding herself together while she falls apart, taking her finals and attending grief support groups and calling her mama and doing what Destiny always does, which is everything at once. She says, "How you doing, Mama?" and I say, "I'm here, baby," because that's the only true thing I can say. I'm here. The house is here. The kitchen is here with its cold stove and its refrigerator full of other women's cooking and its cast iron skillet hanging on the hook where it's hung since 1994, waiting. Everything is waiting. So am I. I just don't know what for.

Sister Dorothy brought Salisbury steak on a Wednesday, maybe the fourth or fifth week, and it was the first thing I actually tasted. Not just chewed and swallowed standing at the counter, but tasted — the gravy, the onions, something about the way the meat held together reminded me of suppers Bernice used to stretch across a whole kitchen table in Bessemer. I’m not back at the stove yet. I don’t know when I will be. But I asked Dorothy for the recipe, and she wrote it out on the back of a church bulletin and tucked it under the plate the following week, and I put it on the refrigerator with a magnet, and it’s still there, waiting like everything else.

Salisbury Steak

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 30 minutes | Total Time: 45 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 pounds ground beef (80/20)
• 1/3 cup breadcrumbs
• 1 large egg, beaten
• 2 tablespoons ketchup
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 8 ounces cremini mushrooms, sliced
• 1 medium yellow onion, sliced into rings
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2 cups beef broth
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• Salt and pepper to taste
• Fresh parsley for garnish

Instructions

1. Mix the patties. In a large bowl, combine the ground beef, breadcrumbs, egg, ketchup, 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce, onion powder, garlic powder, salt, and pepper. Mix gently with your hands until just combined. Shape into 4 oval patties, about 3/4 inch thick.
2. Sear the patties. Heat olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add the patties and cook for 4 minutes per side until browned. They don’t need to be cooked through yet. Transfer to a plate and set aside.
3. Cook the mushrooms and onions. In the same skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the sliced mushrooms and onion rings and cook, stirring occasionally, for 5 to 6 minutes until softened and golden.
4. Build the gravy. Sprinkle the flour over the mushrooms and onions and stir for 1 minute. Slowly pour in the beef broth, stirring constantly to prevent lumps. Add the remaining 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce and the Dijon mustard. Stir and bring to a simmer.
5. Simmer the steaks. Return the patties to the skillet, nestling them into the gravy. Reduce the heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer for 15 minutes, until the patties are cooked through and the gravy has thickened.
6. Serve. Spoon the mushroom onion gravy generously over each patty. Garnish with fresh parsley. Serve over mashed potatoes, egg noodles, or rice.

Nutrition (per serving)

Calories: 480 | Protein: 36g | Fat: 30g | Carbs: 16g | Fiber: 1g | Sodium: 890mg