The Older Bolder Life Friday Feast: Spicy Hanger Steak Lettuce Wraps

Having grown up in Texas and spent much of our adult lives wandering around the Southwest and West, my lovely wife and I have have devoured our fair share of great tacos and wraps over the years.

After becoming adamantly Primally-aligned food-wise now almost four years ago, we very rarely enjoy the occasional corn tortilla (much more often than other traditional versions of the veritable tortilla), preferring to use lettuce instead of tortillas or taco shells to transport great proteins from plate to palate.

Living in Texas again, we’re of course smack dab in the middle of fajita and carne asada country, and love our skirt steak dishes and recipes, though of late I’ve been looking for and cooking hanger steak (as in this amazing Hanger Steak Korean Bulgogi Bowl).

Hanger steak comes from the diaphragm of a steer, as does the skirt, though the hanger is the more tender, inner portion of the diaphragm, the skirt the outer portion. Hanger steaks are also known as the “butcher’s cut”, as they historically have been kept by the butcher for their own enjoyment. Ask your butcher or meat-cutter; they should have some of these around…

Pre-freezing the meat for a short time before slicing makes it a breeze to thinly slice, and as I’ve said many times before, after experimenting for years with a variety of alternative sweeteners, in the big picture considering health and nutrition impacts, I still argue that a bit of sugar in a marinade isn’t harmful and sometimes simply cannot be replicated by alternatives in terms of the chemistry of cooking. Substitute as you wish, or leave it out all together.

Bottom line, this is a nifty prep for your taco (lettuce wrap) night, and you have a chance to let your creativity shine as you build your wraps with your toppings / fixin’s.

2-3 red jalapeño or Fresno chiles
3-inch piece of fresh ginger
5 garlic cloves
Juice of two limes
1 tbsp brown sugar, optional (see above)
1 tbsp + 1 tsp toasted sesame oil
1 tbsp good salt

1 and 1/2 pounds hanger steak (skirt or boneless beef short ribs work well too)
2 tbsp avocado oil for cooking

Your favorite lettuce and fixings for lettuce wraps (or tacos), perhaps including:
Chopped cucumbers
Chopped cilantro, parsley, or even basil
Chopped roasted, salted peanuts
Pickled red onions
Thinly sliced radishes
A batch of your favorite house guacamole
Crumbled cotija
2 or 3 quartered limes
Maybe even a recipe of a tasty cauliflower rice (like this one, or this one)

Throw the meat in the freezer while you’re preparing the marinade.

Grate the peppers (yep, seeds and all), ginger, and garlic into a medium bowl; add the lime juice, brown sugar if using, sesame oil, and good salt.

Now slice the meat thinly (I mean thin, not more than 1/4-inch) across the grain; throwing it in the freezer beforehand for a short time makes this much easier. Now add the meat to the marinade bowl and mix thoroughly, your hands are best here, to make sure the meat is well coated. Let it marinate for at least 30 minutes at room temp, or even better, overnight in the fridge (covered of course).

When ready to cook, remove from the fridge and let warm slightly while preparing your lettuce wraps and your chosen fixin’s (use the list above as a starting point).

Preheat your favorite large skillet of medium-high heat, add a tbsp of avocado oil, and half the meat in a single layer. Cook without moving it around for about 3 minutes, or until nice and caramelized. Turn, and cook for another 1-2 minutes until the second side matches the first. Remove the first batch of meat, and repeat with the second.

Set out the meat on a platter and let everyone build their lettuce wrap as they wish; you’ll wish for leftovers but there won’t be any…

Enjoy.