When Robert Klein was honing his craft at Second City in 1965, he managed to bank almost half of his weekly $150 paycheck. Little did the actor anticipate, as the balance slowly grew, that a third of a century later he would be performing at the Goodman Theatre as a man who thinks nothing of treating himself to a $3,000 barbecue grill.
In Eric Bogosian’s play, “Griller” (now in previews before its opening on Monday), Klein plays Gussie, who bought the grill as a 50th birthday present to himself and has gathered four generations of family to celebrate the event in his back yard.
The Baby Boomer son of poor immigrants, Gussie finds himself defending the American way that made him rich. The grill, and the prime steaks Gussie cooks on it, are symbols of the dichotomy in an America that, in the author’s phrase, “wants to live in piggish splendor and be ecologically responsive.”
Gussie not only likes buying fancy toys such as the grill, he also is a creative cook. His recipe for steak is expounded upon at length and printed in the program.
Klein, a passionate kitchen craftsman himself, is skeptical of the rococo creation. It calls for seasoning the steak with butter, salt and powdered garlic, then dunking it into a marinade that includes soy sauce, maple syrup, red wine and yellow mustard.
“I don’t recommend trying to re-create it exactly,” Klein says. “It’s probably wiser to consider it a piece of literature.” (A flavorful adaptation created in the Tribune’s test kitchen appears on this page.)
But the grill itself delights the actor.
“They’ve installed a device so that when I push a button the grill surface with the raw steaks on it flips over and cooked steaks appear. There’s also a great smoke effect.” The steaks, incidentally, aren’t for eating. They’re made of foam rubber.
From his own grilling experiences, Klein has learned “not to be impatient. You have to wait until there is white ash on the coals” before throwing steaks on the grill.
“But I’m really a soup man,” he says. “I can’t throw a turkey carcass away. My favorite soup is based on the cabbage-beef-vegetable soup my mother made. She was an instinctive cook and so am I, so there’s no precise recipe. Also, I always make a lot of soup, 15 quarts or so. I suppose I could make it for two, but what’s the point?”
Here is his oral history of the construction of this memorable soup that has spanned more than two generations: Five pounds or so of beef, top round perhaps, is browned and seasoned. Into the pot go onions (“4 big,”) carrots, bay leaf, garlic, “half a can” of whole tomatoes or tomato sauce, and two heads of cabbage “chopped up.” Water or broth covers all and the soup is allowed to simmer quietly until the meat is very soft and “heavenly.”
Time out for a very funny imitation of Paul Prudhomme, the Cajun chef, reciting a recipe; then Klein recalls some additional ingredients he adds to the soup.
“Parsnips–maybe 3–celery, parsley, but not too much, and lots of dill. For me the parsnips and the dill are the real keys. Also, I hold back some vegetables and chunks of cabbage and add them late so they are still firm when I serve the soup. At the end, I tweak the flavor with cayenne pepper and some balsamic vinegar. It’s all instinct.”
Like most earthy soups, this one improves with age. “It peaks at around five days,” Kline says.
A working clone of Gussie’s grill, produced by Weber-Stephen, is on display in the Goodman lobby. It will be awarded to a theatergoer through a drawing at the end of the play’s run.
GUSSIE’S SPECIAL STEAK WITH MARINATED VEGGIES
Preparation time: 35 minutes
Marinating time: Overnight
Cooking time: 18-22 minutes
Yield: 4 servings
Meat:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon each: coarse salt, garlic powder, see note
1 sirloin steak, about 1 1/2-2 pounds
Vegetables:
2 onions, quartered
1 each, seeded, cut into 8 pieces: red and green bell pepper
8 mushrooms, wiped clean
Marinade:
1 cup each: soy sauce, water, red wine
1/2 cup maple syrup
1 tablespoon dry yellow mustard
Basting sauce:
1/2 cup each: tomato paste, red wine
2 tablespoons ground black pepper
Serving sauce:
2 vine-ripened tomatoes, seeded, chopped
2 cups finely chopped cilantro
1/2 sweet onion, chopped
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
Salt, freshly ground pepper to taste
1. For meat, combine butter, salt and garlic powder in small bowl; mix well. Rub butter mixture over both sides of steak. Cover; refrigerate at least 4 hours or overnight.
2. For vegetables, place onions, bell peppers and mushrooms in large bowl; set aside. Combine soy sauce, water, red wine, maple syrup, salt and dry mustard in medium bowl; mix well. Pour marinade over vegetables; toss to coat. Cover; refrigerate overnight.
3. Prepare grill. Remove vegetables from marinade, reserving marinade. Put each kind of vegetable on separate skewers, (Onions will take the most time to cook, mushrooms the least.) Grill until vegetables are crisp-tender.
4. Pour reserved marinade over meat. Let sit 10 minutes. For basting sauce, stir together tomato paste, red wine and pepper in medium bowl.
5. When vegetables are about half done, place steaks on grill. Sear each side of steaks. Baste each side with basting sauce. Continue grilling, basting occasionally, until desired doneness, about 7 minutes per side. Keep warm.
6. For serving sauce, place tomatoes, cilantro, onion, olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper in medium saucepan. Warm sauce until heated through but not boiling.
7. To serve, cut steak into thin strips. Divide meat and vegetables among plates; pass sauce.
Test kitchen note: 1 to 2 minced cloves garlic can be substituted for garlic powder.
Nutrition information per serving:
Calories ……… 790 Fat ………… 60 g Cholesterol .. 156 mg
Sodium …… 1,107 mg Carbohydrates .. 13 g Protein …….. 52 g
