Fillet of beef with grilled prawn and tomato salsa

Serves 4

This is a kind of sophisticated surf and turf dish; and it's great to serve at a dinner party straight off the barbecue. As you may have noticed, I rarely use fillet of beef, for the reason that it's often not left to hang on the carcass for very long, and it is cut out and vacuum packed soon after slaughter so there's very little flavour remaining.

If you know your butcher well enough and he hangs his own meat, ask him to keep the fillet on the carcass when it's hung and cut it out when it's mature. When I trained as a chef, we were taught to trim the fillet to a completely clean eye of meat, removing the chain and everything else. I think that is sacrilege on such a premium cut, because the chain is a tasty bit of the fillet and that outer crust, as long as it hasn't gone too green, gives the meat some character.

4 fillet steaks weighing about 180g each
1tbsp vegetable oil
4 large sea water prawns with the heads on or 8 smaller ones

For the tomato salsa

1 medium red onion, peeled and finely chopped
1 clove of garlic, peeled and crushed
1 small green chilli, seeded and finely chopped
3tbsp olive oil
6 ripe plum or round tomatoes, skinned, halved and seeds removed
1tsp coarsely chopped oregano leaves
1tsp balsamic vinegar
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

First make the salsa. Very gently cook the onion, garlic and chilli in a tablespoon of the olive oil for 3-4 minutes, stirring every so often until soft, then remove from the heat. Chop the tomatoes into a rough 1cm dice and mix with the onion mixture. Stir in the oregano and balsamic vinegar and season.

Pre-heat a barbecue or ribbed griddle, season the steaks and lightly brush them with oil. Grill for 3-4 minutes on a high heat on each side for rare, depending on the thickness, allowing a couple of minutes more for medium. While they are cooking, season and grill the prawns for 2-3 minutes on each side.

To serve, spoon the salsa on to plates, lay the fillet on top and a prawn on each fillet.