Marinated skirt steak on a fresh roots salad and crispy matchstick fries

Name: Marinated skirt steak on a fresh roots salad and crispy matchstick fries
Total time: 45 min
Ingredients: 600g of beef skirt; 3 tbsp of olive oil; 2 tbsp of honey; 1 tbsp of white wine vinegar; 1 garlic clove, crushed; 1/2 tsp pepper; 3 carrots, multi-coloured or plain; 1 beetroot, red or yellow; parsley; 1 tsp apple vinegar; 1 tsp olive oil; 2 tbsp of natural yoghurt; salt; pepper; 3 potatoes, floury; oil, for deep frying

by Regula Ysewijn

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easy
2
45 minutes

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Regula shares her beautiful marinated skirt steak recipe, serving this underused cut as a steak dish with winter coleslaw and deliciously crispy matchstick fries. The colours of the beef with the vibrant root salad make the dish as visually appealing as it is tasty.

First published in 2016

I must admit I do enjoy a good piece of beef from time to time. I tend to hunt down the best quality and then price really isn’t an issue for me. I'd rather eat less meat, but spend a little more on a great product. And even so, you can find cheaper cuts, which are just as tasty as a steak, but many people don’t buy them as they are unsure on how to prepare them.

Skirt steak is a cut of beef which is often overlooked, it is long and flat and can be found in the plate which is situated after the brisket and before the flank. It is the ideal cut for stir-fries, and for making fajitas when it is pan-seared or grilled very quickly to prevent the meat from going tough. Slowly cooked it is the preferred cut to use in Cornish pasties.

Today I am going to quickly pan-sear the skirt, so I am marinating it and pounding it gently before cooking. Pounding the meat so it becomes flatter tenderises the meat by breaking down the connective tissue. The meat is then served with a roots salad with yoghurt dressing and matchstick fries. It is nice to have these delicate little fries with this as the meat is quite delicate as well, yet full of flavour.

Ingredients

Metric

Imperial

Marinated skirt steak

600g of beef skirt
3 tbsp of olive oil
2 tbsp of honey
1 tbsp of white wine vinegar
1 garlic clove, crushed
1/2 tsp pepper

Fresh root salad

3 carrots, multi-coloured or plain
1 beetroot, red or yellow
parsley
1 tsp apple vinegar
1 tsp olive oil
2 tbsp of natural yoghurt
salt
pepper

Matchstick fries

3 potatoes, floury
oil, for deep frying

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Method

First make the marinade, as the meat needs to rest in it for at least 2 hours (preferably overnight)

Mix all of the ingredients together in a bowl and set aside. Place the meat in a heavy duty freezer bag and pound it with the back of a pan or a meat mallet if you have one. Don’t bash it too hard, just flatten it out a little so it is about 1cm thick

Now pour the marinade into the bag. Massage the meat with it, close-up the bag and chuck it into the fridge to rest

Heat your oven on low to warm 3 plates – 2 for serving and 1 to rest the meat

For the root salad, use a food processor or mandoline (careful!) to finely grate the carrots and beets. Chop the parsley finely and mix in with the roots. Make a dressing by mixing together a little apple vinegar, olive oil, yoghurt, salt and pepper. Toss the dressing with the roots

If you used more vegetables you might need to double the amount of dressing. Cover the salad and place in the fridge until needed, or serve at once

For the matchstick fries, use a mandoline to carefully cut matchsticks from the floury potatoes. You could also cut them by hand if you like, 3–4mm is the size to go for. Pour enough olive oil into a wok or deep pan to cover the bottom generously so fries are kept drowned at all times during frying

Test the heat of the oil by carefully putting in 1 fry, if it starts to sizzle immediately then your oil is ready. You could use a deep-fryer too of course but I tend to let it sit in the basement to gather dust

Batch fry the fries and put them on kitchen paper to absorb the oil

While batch frying – don’t forget to heat your plates – let a heavy grill pan become scorching hot to fry the meat. Remove the meat from the bag and remove the excess marinade (leave a little on – there's no need to dry it completely)

Place the meat in the pan and let it fry until it comes away from the pan, which means that side is done. Turn and do the same on the other side. Now add plenty of butter, and when I say plenty I mean a lot. While it melts use a spoon to splash butter over the meat, this is to keep it moist. Don’t fry for too long as it needs to be medium rare

Take it out of the pan and leave it to rest on one of the warm plates while you finish off frying your matchstick fried. You might need to heat up your first batch at the end

When your meat has rested, this takes about 5 minutes, cut into thin slices of about 1cm wide and serve with the roots salad and matchstick fries. A good way to see if your meat has rested enough is to cut into it – if the juices flow out, rest it some more

The meat will have a beautiful red wine colour on the inside, and the colours with the root salad will be very pretty. Maybe you have some homemade mayo as well? Then use it!

First published in 2016

Regula Ysewijn

Food photographer, graphic designer and author of Pride and Pudding (Murdoch 2016).

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