Bavette steak and compound butter

Unusually for such a cheap cut, bavette steak can be cooked quickly with great success.   But a few tricks can improve things greatly.  You should marinate the meat for at least 24 hours, and the acid in the onion will help tenderise the steak.  Bavette does however need to be served rare or medium rare or it will be tough.  If you prefer well done steaks then this is just not one for you.  Lastly if you slice the steak across the grain after resting it will be much nicer to eat.

I have also seen a recipe for steak tartare using bavette, first sliced very thinly across the grain, so all in all it's a winner.  It sometimes goes by the name of skirt steak in the UK, and is similar to the onglet cut.


Bavette Steak

Serves 4

1/2 onion, finely sliced
4 cloves garlic, chopped (not too fine otherwise the bits will be hard to scrape off and will burn)
100ml light olive oil
1/2 tsp black pepper
1tsp thyme leaves

4 x 175g bavette steaks, sufficiently aged (leave in the fridge for a bit if not), excess membrane removed and cut to a 1 inch thickness if needed.

Marinate the steaks in the above for 24 hours minimum in the fridge.  Remove from the fridge at least an hour before cooking, scrape off the marinade, rub with olive oil, salt lightly and lay on a board to allow to come to room temperature.

Leave a heavy pan or ridged grill over a high heat for 5 minutes to heat up.  Lay the steak in the hot pan.  Leave for around 3 minutes, turning down the heat if burning.  Turn, season, and leave again for another 3 minutes.  Turn up the heat if needed to sear the other side.  3 minutes a side is an estimate. You must prod it with a finger to test, and since it needs to be rare it must be fairly soft to the touch.  If you prod and feel carefully each time you will get the feel for it as you cook successive steaks.  All I would say is this: you need to sear it, but you also need to cook it slightly so it is not completely blue.  Remove to a board, season again and leave to rest for 4 minutes.

Using a sharp knife slice vertically down through the steak, across the grain, into approx 8mm slices.  Serve with chips, salad and the butter spooned over.  You may not need any extra sauce.


Compound Butter


This is very much a theme to be improvised around.  Horseradish and mustard; coriander, lime and Chinese five spice... go for it.

80g butter
1 shallot, finely chopped
1 tsp finely chopped garlic
100ml white wine
lemon juice to taste
finely chopped parsley
salt
pepper

Dice the butter into 1cm cubes then leave for 20 minutes to come to room temperature.  Beat it vigorously with a wooden spoon or a whisk in a sizeable bowl, until it has lightened in colour and doubled in volume.  Alternatively do in a food mixer.  This will give the butter body.

Put the white wine, shallot, garlic and some lemon juice in a small pan and simmer until most of the liquid has gone.  Allow to cool then mix into the butter with the parsley, salt and pepper.

Melt gently in a saucepan, stirring, to keep the sauce's body, or use to gently deglaze the steak pan after having poured off any excess oil.  Taste once melted and correct for lemon, salt and pepper.

This had actually marinated for 4 days

The rest

Sliced across the grain