Main · 45 minutes, mostly resting · Serves 2
Steak with Chilli Libre
Most commercial steak rubs contain sugar, and most of them do not tell you how much. On a low grill that sugar caramelises and helps. In a screaming pan it does something else: it burns before the crust has formed, and what you taste afterwards is not char, it is scorched sugar.
Chilli Libre has no sugar in it at all. Seven ingredients, salt first, and nothing in there that will catch before the meat does. That makes it a rub rather than a finishing blend, and it goes on before the pan rather than after.
Because the salt is already in the blend, do not season twice. Rub, wait, cook.
- Serves
- 2
- Time
- 45 minutes, mostly resting
Ingredients
- 1 thick-cut sirloin, about 400 g, with its fat cap on
- 2 tsp Chilli Libre
- 1 tsp neutral oil
Method
- Take the steak out of the fridge and pat it properly dry on both faces. A wet surface steams, and a steamed surface never crusts.
- Rub the Chilli Libre over both faces and press it in. Leave it at room temperature for 30 minutes. The salt in the blend draws moisture out and then takes it back in seasoned, which is the whole reason for waiting.
- Get a heavy pan very hot and dry. Add the oil, then the steak, and do not move it for two minutes.
- Turn it, then hold it on its fat edge with tongs for a minute or so until the fat has rendered and gone golden. That edge is where most of the flavour lives and it needs its own time.
- Cook to your liking, then rest on a warm plate for at least half as long as it cooked.
- Slice against the grain and spoon over any juice from the resting plate.