Low-Budge Dinner: Steak with shallot sauce, roasted asparagus and steak fries

This month I'm featuring low-budge recipes -- tasty dinners that cost little. This one reminds me of the yummy steak frites we would get all the time in France. For this one, get your cheap steak at the store -- on sale -- and we'll make a red wine shallot sauce to give it some flavor.

Rosemary and garlic oven steak fries
First off, preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Take 2 Idaho potatoes or sweet potatoes, cleaned, and cut them in half lengthwise, then take one half and cut it lengthwise into thirds. Repeat with the other one. Place in a large tupperware with a lid. Take 2 large cloves of garlic and mince, add to tupperware. Take about 4 tablespoons of fresh chopped rosemary and add that too. Add 2 tbs olive oil to the tuper ware, 1/4 tsp salt and a dash of pepper. Toss.

Roasted asparagus
Asparagus was on sale too -- the really fat ones -- so, we snapped off the bottoms and added those to the tupperware to mix the ingredients. You could do the same with brocolli, cauliflower or another hearty veggie.

Spray a cookie sheet with spray oil and place the fries and asparagus on one layer. Place in heated 400 degree oven for 30-40 minutes, turning after 20 minutes.

Grilled Steak with Shallot wine sauce
While the taters are cookin', heat a grill pan and grill your steaks. While those guys are going, in a small saucepan, heat 2-3 tbs of butter/butter substitute/olive oil. Add 2 shallots, diced (these are those midget onions, not the green onions) with 2 tsp of herbes de provence or italian seasoning. Heat over medium-low heat until shallots are translucent. Add 1 cup red wine to deglaze the pan. Simmer, stirring while it reduces.

Hopefully everything will finish at the same time. Plate em up! We had some sour cream, so we dipped the fries in that. YUM! It looks very high-budget, but it didn't really cost that much. And fresh rosemary is awesome -- get a fresh bunch and you will use it the whole week. If you don't, just tie it up and let it dry.

DESSERT - Boxed tricked-out yellow cake and chocolate frosting

I had a craving for boxed yellow cake with that chocolate frosting that comes in the plastic can. I don't know why. So I made the cake. BUT I added stuff to the batter. It was a "super moist" yellow cake mix. I didn't have any real butter (it called for 1 or 1 1/2 sticks), so I added 1/4 cup of plain low-fat yogurt, 1 tbsp of vegan shortening, and 1/4 cup of canola oil. I also added 2 tbsp of ground flax seeds. The rest of the recipe called for 3 eggs, which I added. You could probably get away with only using 2 though because the rest of the stuff I added would bind it all together. I followed the directions for cooking and frosted it with that chocolate frosting that comes in the white plastic packaging. YUM.