I don't have the cookbook. I'm curious, what cut of meat did he use for the CFS? When I make it, which is rarely, I use round steak and I beat the s*** out of it with a meat mallet! I could pay extra for the stuff they run through the tenderizer at the butcher shop, but hey, I'm frugal.
The recipe called for round steak, cut into equal portions, then pounded to 1/4-inch thickness. I didn't have any round steak in the freezer so I substituted cube steak.
I know what you mean about pounding the beegeepers out of meat to tenderize it. I've used everything from a mallet to the edge of a ceramic plate. That is, until Buck gave me a 48-blade jaccard tenderizer for Christmas last year. It's an awesome tool. It can make a combat boot tender. You might want to check into getting one. I use mine on almost every type of meat and/or poultry.