Carne Asada

If you went to every taco shop in California and asked what was the most popular item, I’d bet my wife’s pinky toe that carne asada burrito would be the most popular item. If you have Netflix, go watch the carne asada episode of The Taco Chronicles. Go do it now, I’ll wait.

Carne Asada is generally made with skirt steak, flank steak, or flap meat. I prefer flap meat or skirt steak as they tend to have more marbling than flank steak. That means a more tender, flavorful cut of beef. It’s a simple, beautiful thing to cook that is universally loved by everyone, even vegans.

What you’ll need -

• 2 lbs Skirt steak or flap meat.

• 1/2 cup lime juice

• 1/4 cup orange juice

• 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil, or a more neutral oil if you prefer

• 1/4 cup soy sauce. yup soy sauce.

• 1-2 chipotles in adobo, depending on if you want to crank up the heat a bit

• 1 bunch cilantro

• 3 cloves garlic

• 1 tsp salt

• 1 tsp pepper

• 1 tsp cumin

• 1 tbsp brown sugar

Throw it all in the blender (not the meat dummy). Taste (always taste everything, I’ll repeat this a lot). Pour it all over the meat in a ziplock bag. Massage the bag and make sure the all of the meat has the marinade on it. Get as much air out of the bag as possible, seal it, and throw it in the fridge. You can do this a couple of hour before you cook the meat and it should taste great. I like to marinate this recipe for 24 hours but not longer than that. If you do it the same day as cooking it that’s ok though.

Heat up your grill to really hot and get your meat out of the fridge. Some people say to rinse the marinade off the meat but I prefer to leave it on. Throw it on the grill and give it a nice sear. These cuts of meat are thin and cook fast, 3-5 per side depending on how hot your grill is. I like mine nice and pink and medium rare. About 130 internal temp if you’ve got a meat thermometer, which you should just because they are handy, even if you don’t need one to grill properly. When the meat is done let it sit on the counter with a napkin or something covering it for 7-8 minutes. It needs to rest, otherwise when you slice it all the juice will come running out and your guests that know how to grill will look at you with disdain for at least 3 years, or until you’ve successfully smoked a bacon wrapped meatloaf. Your steak should be one long cut. So now cut it into 4 inch sections before you slice it. The reason you do that is because you need to slice it against the grain. This is important. If you slice with the grain it has a slightly chewier texture.

Serve it with your favorite toppings or just eat it like a steak. Putting it in a taco with guacamole and salsa roja or pico de gallo is pretty standard, and there’s a reason for that. It’s friggin awesome. I like to add a little queso fresco as well. Otherwise blend it and put it into a meat smoothie. jk