Churrasco

Churrasco

I've been making this a lot lately, and it is getting REALLY good now.

To start, it's best to go to a Mexican grocer, since this cut of meat is much cheaper there ($6-7/lb). However, a big key is to get the butcher to take off the silver skin and to tenderize the meat in advance. So, be sure ask them to do that no matter where you pick up the meat.

I've come to realize, the real key ingredient is the brown sugar. It seems the more you put in the better it turns out, especially if you balance it with plenty of spice from the red pepper flakes

Ingredients:
1.5-2lbs skirt steak, trimmed and tenderized by the butcher
5 cloves garlic, minced or slivered
1-2 limes
4 green onions, slivers
1/4-1/3 cup brown sugar
5-6 Tbsp Olive Oil
3-4 Tbsp Soy sauce- I use half dark and half light
Red Pepper flakes or diced thai bird chiles

optionals- 1/2tsp cumin, 1 jalepeno, diced, 1/2 teaspoon baking soda (as tenderizer)

garlic not shown, zoom in for the base recipe (from Alton Brown)

So, it's really easy to be honest. Maybe 10min prep time if you dice fast.

I get a freezer bag, pour the olive oil in, add the soy sauces (I think using dark soy makes this WAY better), squeeze in the lime juice (I throw the peel of half of one lime in there too), dice the onion and throw that in, add the sugar and pepper flakes and shake the bag to incorporate. (add 1/2 tsp baking soda as tenderizer and diced jalepeno if using)

Then I open the meat package, season both sides of meat strips with salt, pepper and fresh ground cumin, and throw that in the bag.

you can see the butcher's tenderizer marks

everything shaken and incorporated- just add seasoned meat!

Skirt steak comes in really long strips. I always cut these down to 8-10 inch long pieces.

Marinate overnight, then grill over really hot charcoal for 3-4 minutes a side. After taking off the grill, let the meat sit! One also very important part (you can Google this if you don't know)- always cut across the grain! I slice the resulting meat into strips and we use this in tacos or whatever else we are making.

HUMMUS

Hummus

I actually don’t have a clue how to make this authentically, but this turns out pretty good

Ingredients:

1 14oz can garbonzo beans

½-1 lemon

2-3 cloves garlic

1 Tbsp Tahini

Olive Oil, Salt, dash of cayenne

Cilantro or parsley as garnish if on hand

Directions:

Either smash the garlic cloves in advance or dice them or just zap them in the blender first before adding the beans. In my batch, we still had 2 whole cloves that didn’t get pureed correctly.

Otherwise, just add all the ingredients to the blender and zap. It’s a taste game, where adding salt really starts to bring the flavor out. We used about ¾ the garbonzo bean can for the amount we made here, using only half the lemon, and not all the garlic cloves that are shown. I even added a dash of vinegar as well as a bit of cayenne. Maybe a dash of hot sauce would be good too, or some other spice, like white pepper or coriander?

don't add the garlic whole! Use a press or smash or blitz them alone first