I have had a resistance to the flank or skirt steak for many years now. I think I gave the flank steak a go many many years ago, without success, and that memory seems to have been seared in the back of my mind. But I keep seeing all these recipes calling for flank steak and have had one on file for almost 2 years now that I have been wanting to try. So when flank steak came on sale recently, I jumped on it and bought a couple pounds. I can honestly say, though, that my recollection of this cut of beef is that it was a cheaper cut to buy, which is far from today’s reality.
And here is what I did with it:
Meal 1: a traditional steak fajita recipe that I pulled from a 2009 Better Homes and Gardens Special Interest “Mexican” issue. Yes, I still have magazines and cook books. Its honestly an obsession of mine: cookbooks along with recipes, the Food Network, and the reality cooking show. But in the big scheme of things, are those really that bad of an obsession? I mean, it could be worse. I could be obsessed with something else like tequila, right?
In my attempt to purge some of those cookbooks recently, I came across a steak fajita recipe and gave it a whirl. Now honestly, it was not what I expected and was a bit of a let down. So for now, that is not a recipe I intend to share until I have altered and absolutely perfected it. It was flat, flavourless and an utter disappointment. But that’s ok. It had good “bones” to it (even though there are no bones in a flank steak) and I can work with that to make it better.
Meal 2: The Mongolian Beef recipe that I have had stashed on my computer for 2 years: now that was a winner (Winner Winner Flank Steak Dinner!). OMG it was amazing. It was relatively easy, it was saucy and extremely flavourful and just thinking about it makes me salivate and want to make it again, already. The sauce does call for a myriad of Asian ingredients, but that’s ok, it is well worth stocking up the pantry to make this dish. A true 10 out of 10 for sure. My only comment on this dish is that it had a wee bit more heat than I expected, especially for only adding one pepper, when the recipe called for 4 to 6 dried chilies.
So with that (it had more heat than I expected), I asked myself, did I use the wrong kind of pepper? And then searched out the often referenced Scoville Scale that sets out the heat levels of peppers.
For those of you not familiar with the scale, the Scoville Scale is a scale of measurement on how “spicy” a chili is. Created in 1912, the scale essentially indicates how many times something must be diluted with an equal volume of water until people can no longer feel any sensation from the capsaicin (the content responsible for their heat). The scale ranges from zero (meaning no heat) to 16 million (meaning blow your freaking top off hot!). The ghost pepper ranks at about 1 million heat units on the scale, and my tastebuds cannot actually imagine something that registers 16 Million on the Scoville Scale.
I thought I would share the scale I often reference at the supermarket when trying to figure out which hot pepper to buy. This scale shows some common peppers and their Scoville heat unit.
Now back to Meal 2.
There is a bit of prep to the meal, but honestly this is a relatively quick meal for a weeknight. And here are a few tips for success with this recipe:
Tip 1: Slice the meat the night before and marinate over night. Marinating with baking soda helps to tenderize the meat and marinating enhances flavour absorption, creates a protective barrier preventing the meat from drying out, adds moisture and juiciness, and accelerates the cooking time.
Tip 2: Make sure your cut the meat against the grain in nice, thin slices.
Tip 3: While this is a one pan meal, it goes well with a side of steamed rice so pull out that rice cooker friends.
So there you have it. How I took the bull by the horns and finally incorporated the flank steak back into my cooking life. And it wasn’t a fluke!
Ingredients
Method
- Trim any excess fat off the flank steak. Slice the flank steak across the grain into thin slices.
- Combine the cornstarch, baking powder, salt and water in a ziplock bag.
- Add the steak and oil to the cornstarch mixture in the ziplock and massage all the ingredients together.
- Refrigerate for a minimum 2 hours to overnight. Massage the meat periodically if you can.
- Clean and thinly slice your ginger into tiny matchsticks size slices.
- In a small bowl, combine the oyster sauce, hoisin sauce, soy sauce, cornstarch, vinegar, garlic and half the sliced ginger. Set aside.
- Prepare your vegetables by chopping the onion and red and green bell peppers into large dices. Set aside.
- Slice your green onions on the bias and separate whites from greens. Set aside.
- Clean and finely dice your chilies. For more heat, leave some seeds in. For less heat, remove the seeds. Set aside.
- Heat your oil in a wok.
- Stir in the beef mixture and cook until med-rare, stirring constantly, for around 3 minutes.
- Add the garlic and the remaining ginger and saute another 30 seconds.
- Stir in the bell peppers and onions, cooking approximately 2 minutes, until the edges start to brown.
- Add the whites from your green onions, the chilies, and the sauce mixture and let cook about 2 more minutes until the sauce thickens.
- Garnish with the greens from the green onions and serve with rice.
2 thoughts on “Was My Flank a Fluke? Slice it Right!”
Haven’t made the recipe but rating it 5 stars because it sounds AMAZING.
And… obsession with tequila is a problem?
You are by far my favourite follower!
Comments are closed.