These guys are so long we end up having to roll them to get them into the case.
Being the total newbie that I was, I turned to Google to provide me with the necessary info to find and extract this seemingly exotic cut. I took one look at a google image search, and thought I had it figured out. It was a long, grainy cut – clearly matching what I thought of as sirloin flap, aka bavette. Sure, ours was much thicker and wider in the middle, but then again our beef was heritage breed and obviously would have some different characteristics. That piece of diaphragm off the rib – the real skirt steak – was too weird and thin to be any use as a steak. So anyway, I pack up the bavette, head into manhattan and gleefully present it to the chef when he came to pick up his order. The chef, knowing much more than I did at the time about obscure cuts of meat, was – for lack of a better term – pissed the hell off. We went back and forth for a little bit, me swearing up and down that the cut was skirt, him telling me that there was no way an animal grew a skirt steak 4 inches wide. He finally left with the bavette, but not before drawing the attention of several onlookers, not the least of which being a well-known TV personality who was buying honey one stall over. New York is a weird place.
The point there is not to demonstrate my fallibility, because at this point I have none, but really to show just how far this humble cut has come in just a matter of years. Once relegated to the grind bin, only to be seen in it’s whole form in shady taquerias in the furthest reaches of Queens, the humble skirt steak is at the epicenter of a “cool cuts of beef’ renaissance. Food bloggers ventured out into those far flung carnicerias and brought back tales of the wonderful cut being sold like hotcakes. Of course, all of this attention has its downsides. Chief among which is the fact that a single steer only posses 2 skirt steaks weighing in at a total of 3 pounds max. At our shop the waiting list for skirt steak can top 3 weeks. Not bad for a cut that, until recently, was ground into hamburger without any additional thought.
Hanging rib primals, from whence came the skirt.
The muscle itself is one the few that come from the actual inside of the animal – it’s the muscle that controls the diaphragm, [and?] it’s responsible for keeping the steer breathing. From the grain structure the muscle is frequently mistaken for flank (in fact, the Brits call skirt steak “flank”, God only knows why), but skirt is fattier than flank which makes it all the better. Appearance-wise the skirt is long, over two feet in many cases, and thin – it’s less than 2 inches wide, and less than a half inch thick. One of the Spanish names for skirt, Faja, means belt – and the appearance definitely bears that out. Cut that belt up and you’ve got little belts – or fajitas (ohhhhhhhhh, that’s where that comes from).
Combine, and marinate skirt steak overnight. Bring to room temp before cooking and DON’T overcook it. Serve with more rum.