Steak...but not on the egg

Here's an adaptation of my mom's "baked steak" recipe.  My wife actually prefers this to grilled steak, and it is arguably easier to do.

To start with, you need some thick steak.  Mom used to always use bone-in sirloin, usually about 2.5" thick.  I've used sirloin, tenderloin, ribeye, bonless NY strip, porterhouse.  i.e. any nice thick steak will do.

Tonight, it was NY strips, about 1.5lb each.  Preheat the oven to 350F.  Heat up a 12" cast iron pan, add some oil.  Dry off the steaks, and I hit each side of each one with the jaccard to help tenderize them.  When the pan is nice and hot, sear the steaks 1min per side.



Flip.



Sprinkle the tops liberally with kosher salt.



Then a liberal sprinkling of Italian seasoning (again, just on the tops) and toss in some peeled garlic.  If the garlic is big, cut them in half.  I put some olive oil on top of the steaks as well.



Then put the pan in the oven.  I baked these 15 minutes @350F.  When I checked them with the thermopen, one was 125F, the other was 127F.  That's more than done.



With the steaks removed from the pan, you're left with garlic and some juices. 



Crush the garlic with a fork. 



Turn the burner up to about 50-60%.  Add sliced mushrooms.  Pour in some vermouth.  Cook stirring things around until the mushrooms look done and the liquid has thickened but not all boiled away:



Slice and serve.  Since these steaks were about 1.5lb each, we split one and didn't eat all of it.  There's enough for another dinner and probably a good lunch for one after that.



You don't get the grill marks or smoke flavor...but the salt, garlic, and Italian seasoning work pretty well together, and it's hard to get this kind of result in the egg.  (yes...I have actually done this method in the egg, but I didn't feel it was worth the extra work).