Cooking sous-vide skirt steak is the best way to cook this cut at home.
I didn't plan to cook a skirt steak — it's just that this is one of the cuts I can't resist. This is what happened when I walked into the butcher shop the other day and saw this beautiful skirt steak lying on the counter. It wasn't for presentation; I happened to walk in while he was breaking down half a cow and separating it into different cuts.
Skirt is the cut we refer to as a hanger steak. Hanger steak is derived from the diaphragm and sits in the lower part of the cow's belly. When I saw this one I had to grab it — it weighed 670 grams, the biggest skirt I've ever gotten. Going for the record!
Sous-vide Skirt steak at home 100% foolproof
Cooking skirt at home isn't difficult. All this cut needs is a quick sear on a hot pan or grill — it has so much flavor and is so rich in taste. The reason is that the diaphragm has a lot of blood because it's a muscle that works constantly.
That said, this cut tends to be chewy, and that's why the long sous-vide cook is absolutely essential to get the most out of this steak.
I use sous-vide cooking for most of my meat cuts today, certainly the ones that are suited for a sear. It's just the most accurate way to cook meat, and I use it often.
The sous-vide cook makes the skirt tender, so after 24 hours all you're left with is a quick sear on the pan — a meal in 10 minutes, and you won't have to ventilate your house for hours afterwards.
Again, it's not a tender cut, and if you don't like to chew on a steak, this isn't the cut for you. Here, I wanted to soften the meat to reduce its toughness and retain all its flavor, while sticking to the basic searing-on-the-pan technique.
Method
1
prepare the meat· 5 minutes
rub the meat with Pepper, salt, thyme and sprinkle olive oil . give it a good rub and roll into round shape for.
**note, you can add the thyme as a whole or crushed, up to you.
2
Sous vide cooking· 24 hrs
set your sous vide cooker to 55C/131F
put the rolled Skirt in a sealed bag , sprinkle some olive oil and cook for 24hrs
3
searing ans serving· 5 minutes
take the cut out of the bag, let it rest for 10 minutes, unfold it and sear it on a an iron skillet about a minute on each side, no oil is needed. let the hanger rest 5 more minutes and serve, it should be medium-rare.
Jaron Kimhi — self-taught home cook from Tel Aviv, writing and cooking every recipe on this site himself. 20+ years of tinkering in the kitchen, leaning toward slow cooking, classic technique, and honest ingredients.
