14 to 28 days is generally the average time restaurants take to age their steaks. When you prep the beef for grilling or searing, don't trim off too much fat from the steak. For tough, thinner cuts of steak like skirt, hanger, and flank, and London broil, consider an acidic marinade for more tender results (and more surface flavor!). Cook the meat for another three to four minutes on the other side for a medium-rare center. They're all in the freezer, and you don't want to wait while they thaw; you want your steak now. Common marinade ingredients, such as wine, ginger, lemon juice, and kosher salt, actually have double purposes. Invest in a good steak knife. For tough, thinner cuts of steak like skirt, hanger, and flank, and London broil, consider an acidic marinade for more tender results (and more surface flavor!). Tenderizing steak the fast and frugal way. skirt steak FTW!!! discussion from the Chowhound Home Cooking, Beef food community. This doesn't happen right away; it can take hours. It looks and cooks like a skirt steak, but it cuts like a tender steak from the loin. It's a basic law of cooking: whenever you're really craving something, you don't have it. You'd kill for a steak? Marinating meat will add flavor, but it won’t make a tough cut more tender. Alternatively, rub half a kiwi fruit on short ribs or flank steak until the liquid is absorbed before transferring the meat to a grill. Each fruit contains enzymes that tenderize meat. Fajitas are traditionally made from skirt steak, a flap of meat that hangs down in the area of the cow known as the plate -- near the belly.The meat boasts a rich flavor that's quite beefy and buttery. Read the How do you make skirt steaks tender? Hangar steak is also similar to skirt steak, both are from the “plate” area. Chances are you finished the bottle while braising meat last night. Skirt steak isn't terribly tender, but its coarse texture soaks up tenderizing marinades readily. As you can imagine, a cut of meat like the flank has the exact opposite qualities. @Tya- oh I haven’t written up recipe yet – it’s a future blog post, so stay tuned! All you want is a glass of wine? Tenderize the cube steak with a mallet. Join the discussion today. @Kenny yeah! I can buy a 4-pound bag for less than two dollars. Other alternative steaks include the ranch steak and petite tender (also called mock tender), both from the shoulder clod, and tri-tip steaks from the bottom of the sirloin primal. Want nothing more than a sandwich right now? In the case of pineapple juice, the marinade should not be left too long -- no more than 30 minutes -- or it will turn some steaks and chicken breast mushy. Cover your steak in a plastic bag or plastic wrap, and pound it thoroughly, until the entire steak is covered with marks from the mallet. Longer for thicker cuts. For the 10 Ways to Make Cheap Steak Tender and Delicious Slideshow, click here. The reason is that the New York strip is known to be one of the most tender of steaks out there -- thanks to its short muscle fibers and small amount of connective tissue. The Best and Fastest Way to ... Lay the steak or strip flat on a chopping board and repeatedly stab it with a Jaccarding tenderizer, which pierces the meat with rows of sharp needles. There's nothing worse than a tough, leathery steak that's hard to cut and chew. The Best and Fastest Way to Tenderize Meat. Flip the steak with metal tongs. 28 to 45 days is when really intense flavor starts to emerge and the meat gets very tender. Well, here's a simple, frugal, fast way to tenderize steak. Meat with a lot of connective tissue can be tenderized by cooking it until the collagen melts away, which starts to happen between 160 and 200 F. When the connective tissue melts, it turns into gelatin, which is soft and jiggly rather than tough and chewy.