T-bone steak with chipotle butter

Last fall, we took the plunge into the dark world of cow-buying. Specifically, we bought a quarter portion of a cow from a friend’s grandpa. We’re not exactly insatiable carnivores, maybe more flexitarian (I know, pulling out the latest chic terms), but we do enjoy good meat. This stuff is high-quality, we know the source and he’s local, and of course it’s a great value. We ended up with about a hundred pounds, with an average cost of a little over $3/lb, including the processing. That $3 includes ground beef, but also a variety of ribs, roasts, and steaks, including the star of today’s show, the T-bone.

This recipe comes courtesy of Food Network and Emeril. Note that we roughly halved the original recipe.

Ingredients you’ll need:

• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup Essence, recipe follows
• 2 (48-ounce) T-bone steaks
• 1 stick unsalted butter, softened
• 2 teaspoons chopped chipotle chiles in abodo sauce
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon adobo sauce
• 1 teaspoon fresh lime juice
• 1/2 teaspoon ground coriander seeds
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

First step is to get the steak marinating. We split one steak, so we used a little less of the Essence. As with just about everything else, I didn’t actually measure any of this stuff out, just eyeballed it, and it turned out fine. Speaking of that, here’s what you need to make the Essence:

• 2 1/2 tablespoons paprika
• 2 tablespoons salt
• 2 tablespoons garlic powder
• 1 tablespoon black pepper
• 1 tablespoon onion powder
• 1 tablespoon cayenne pepper
• 1 tablespoon dried leaf oregano
• 1 tablespoon dried thyme

Combine this with the oil to make kind of a runny paste. Apply liberally to both sides of the meat, then set aside or cover in plastic wrap, and let it sit for at least a few hours, or up to a day. Refrigerated, of course.

In the meantime, mix the butter, chilis, adobo sauce, lime juice, coriander, and salt. The recipe then calls for putting the mixture in plastic wrap, forming into a log, and refrigerating, but since we like things as easy as possible, we left it in the bowl, and just jumped to the refrigerate part. I like dollops, not neat slices. And it all melts anyways, so it really doesn’t matter.

When the steak has sat long enough for your liking, cook it! I pan-seared it on each side, for about two minutes apiece. Next, I transferred it to a  baking dish, and put a few dollops (or slices, if you prefer) of the butter on the top, and popped it into the oven at 350 F for about eight minutes more. I know this is borderline heresy to some people, but the grill is buried in the garage, and I just didn’t have the energy to get it out. I ended up with a nice medium finish. If you like your steak rare, you can probably just get away with the pan-searing step. I’ve never done steaks this way (usually I just go straight to the grill or oven), but it turned out very nice, so I’ll definitely do it again in the future.

Serve with whatever you have lying around. We had some more fresh corn-on-the-cob, and best of all, there was some butter left over (intentionally), so we slathered our corn with chipotle butter too. Muy delicioso.