From Sour to Savoury - Meat and Marinades

Marinades have a long history dating back to the Renaissance. The original purpose of a marinade was to slow spoilage and enhance flavour of meat, though it had an added, unintended benefit of tenderizing especially tough cuts of flesh. Slowing spoilage was the main event - no refrigeration meant that one had to do what they could to ensure meat was slightly more shelf stable than it naturally is (read: not at all).

Marinading also had the benefit of being incredibly simple: add meat to a vat of acidic liquid, and you are done. In populations with no access to education, this was a lifeline. Now, it is a useful hands-off technique to add flavour, and tenderize tougher (and cheaper!) cuts of meat.

The way marinades work is that the acid in the marinade weakens muscle tissue, and increases its ability to retain moisture. This helps an otherwise tough cut of meat (like a short rib, trotter, or oxtail) become much more delicate and moist when eaten. Stews, like a beef bourguignon, benefit greatly from marinading, as the long cook time helps to mellow out the slowly rendering fat from a tough cut of neck or shoulder.

It's worth noting that over-marinading can give the outside of your meat a sour flavour, as marinades penetrated slowly and, if the meat is simply placed in a bag with it, will penetrate from the outside in. Since the outside is exposed for longer, it will take on more acidity and sour flavour. A way to avoid this is to reduce large cuts to smaller pieces, or to use a syringe and inject the marinade into the different interior parts of the meat.  

Base Components of a Marinade

Acid

This is the main ingredients of any marinade, and in the old days of the renaissance was sometimes the only ingredient. Your acid can be anything as long as it's acidic and you can eat it: vinegar, citrus juice, wine, mirin : whatever you choose will work fine. Also, its important to dilute the acid to the sourness that you want with water or oil/fat, or you could end up pickling the meat by accident and turning it sour (unless this is what you want to do). Once you've chosen your acid, its best to choose seasonings that work well with the flavour of that acid.

Spices/Seasoning

Whatever seasonings or spices you choose, adapt that spice to the nature of a marinade. What this means is: if you are using a leafy herb like oregano or thyme, you can simply put a whole sprig or leaf in the marinade and that will do the trick, no need to dice it up any further. If you are using a warm ground spice like coriander, you will need to expose more of it to the marinade through grinding, crushing, or bruising.

Alliums

It's best to cut these up into smaller pieces, if not fully mince them, as well. The more surface area of the allium that is exposed to the marinade, the more of its flavour compounds will flow into the acid, and then into the meat. Even better, if you blend the marinade together, you will ensure maximum exposure of the meat to all the ingredients of your marinade.

Looking for a guide for cooking steaks? Check out our Butter-Basted Steak recipe!

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How to Make It

First, add dried chilies to a bowl and cover them with hot water. Set them aside and let them rehydrate. Then mix together the orange and lime juice, cumin, oregano, garlic, and salt.

Add the marinade and the steak to a freezer bag and allow them to marinate in the fridge for at least one hour.

While all the steak is marinating, start making the salsa roja. Char your garlic, onion, and tomato in a hot pan or under a broiler. This will add depth to the sauce.

In a dry pan, add your coriander seed and toast on medium-low until fragrant, then set aside.

Add the onion, garlic, tomato, seeds, your now-rehydrated chilies, and a bit of the water used to rehydrate the chilies, and blend all that together until smooth. Leave that aside until the steak is done.

Remove the steaks from the marinade and pat dry with paper towel. Heat a pan up to high, and put a high-smoke-point oil (like canola or grapeseed) into the pan.

Sear the steak over medium-high heat, flipping halfway through, until it is just shy of being done to your liking - it will continue to cook a bit once it's off heat.

Slice your steak into bite sized pieces, warm up your tortilla, and add any and all toppings you want! We added fresh cilantro, guacamole, and pickled onion. They all complimented the salsa roja and steak wonderfully.