Teres Major Steak with Scallion Butter and Cauliflower

I recently tried a Teres Major steak for the first time. Now, I know many things about steaks but I had never heard of this cut before. Some call it a Butcher’s Cut because, as legend goes, it is one of those obscure cuts that the butcher keeps for himself. It is super tender and flavorful like Filet Mignon but the price tag is much lower. So when my meat share sent this to me, I was elated!

Immediately, I began to think about how I wanted to serve this steak so I took a look around my fridge where I found the following items that were still unused from my meal prep earlier that week:

scallions, baby spinach, and half a head of cauliflower. A plan began to form in my mind that involved compound butter with garlic and scallions, sauteed cauliflower and spinach and perfectly seared steak. Oh, it was on.

Here’s what happened:

I removed the steaks from the packaging, placed them lovingly on a plate and patted them down with a paper towel. This is to remove any extra juices and allow the meat to sear nicely. Then, I liberally added pink sea salt and let it sit for about an hour . Alton Brown has a fantastic article as to why pre-salting your steak for at least 40 minutes produces the most perfect steak full of flavor and tenderness. And since Alton is a mad food-scientist, I trust his word as true. https://www.seriouseats.com/2011/03/the-food-lab-more-tips-for-perfect-steaks.html

While the steaks were chilling in salt in the fridge, I began making the compound butter because the ingredients need to hang out together as long as possible before using. So I placed a stick of softened butter into a medium sized bowl and added the scallions, parsley, red chili flakes, and salt and pepper. I didn’t want chunks of garlic, I wanted the garlic to almost melt into the butter, so instead of mincing it, I garlic pressed those magical little cloves into the bowl and mixed everything together, almost whipping the butter. I wrapped the bowl in some plastic wrap and placed it in the fridge to have a little party.

Time for some real talk: I grew up among three out of four brothers who hated, HATED onions. “We’re allergic”, they said. Real bummer for us onion lovers. This meant our household could not even have a single onion in it. So as soon as I had my own kitchen, I filled them with onions! Onion lovers unite! But here’s the deal: if you don’t like onions or have an allergy, don’t use them. It’s fine. You will still love this compound butter.

Now I started prepping my veggies and watched a few cat videos waiting for the steak to finish sitting in the salt. About 15 minutes before the hour was up, I removed the steaks from the fridge, just to let the chill come off a bit. Then I took my favorite cast iron skillet and added some avocado oil. Before I forget, I need to tell you that if you haven’t cooked a steak in a cast iron skilled, your life is incomplete. I’m serious. If you don’t have one, stop everything you are doing this instant and run to the nearest store and buy one! I have three different sized cast iron skillets. But I’m a freak. You don’t need three. One is fine. Or none. You could probably cook this with a frying pan. Or if you have a grill, that would produce a beautifully cooked steak. Just use whatever you have. My preference is cast iron because it creates a sear like nothing else. Ok, rant over. Cooking continued:

I heavily peppered the steak and once the oil in the pan was smoking hot (only do this if using cast iron), I cracked open a window, turned on the oven fan and threw that sweet steak in the skillet. And I DID NOT TOUCH IT for about 4 minutes, letting it develop a gorgeous brown crust on the bottom. (Take your spatula or tongs and lift up a teensy bit of the corner to see if it’s seared. If not, give it another minute.) It had a great sear so I flipped that sucker. Next, I added in a Tbsp of the compound butter to the pan and let it melt at which point I started basting that steak like crazy for about 3-4 minutes to get a medium rare temp. Remember, when cooking steak, you want it to be a little underdone because it needs to rest and as it rests, the temp will come up even more. So be careful not to overcook it. I like my steak medium rare but cook yours to just under your desired temp. An instant read thermometer is great for this but I’m not that fancy. I just go by feel. Here’s a vid showing how to do this: https://youtu.be/O8YQX-QgbXc

The steaks were removed from the pan and set aside to rest, tented with foil. You can see how some of the parsley and garlic melted into the steak.

Now, it was veggie time! 1 tbsp of avocado oil was heated in a non-stick pan on medium heat. The cauliflower was added to the pan but at this point, I did not stir it for a couple of minutes, allowing it to brown beautifully. Then, I just stirred occasionally. Once the cauliflower was softened and browned, baby spinach was thrown into the pan and stirred around until it started to wilt. Since I already had my garlic press out, I used it again, adding a few cloves to the pan, stirring gently until the garlic softened and coated the veggies.

Suddenly, I remembered I had smoked gouda/bacon cheese so I ran swiftly to the fridge, grabbed the cheese and shred it directly into the pan. The fragrance produced by the garlic, cheese and veggies was heavenly.

Now that my veggies were done and the steaks were rested, it was time to serve. First, I needed to slice the steak. Be sure to go against the grain for most moistness. Sorry if that sounded weird.

I slathered the steak with the compound butter (can one use too much butter?) and finished the plate with the veggies. Holy heck, this turned out good! Really, you could make this with any sort of steak. You could sub broccoli for the cauliflower. Or asparagus instead of spinach. Whatever you have on hand or prefer. However, I will tell you, if you can get your hands on a Teres Major cut, your household will be ever grateful.