‘Black and blue’ is the New York restaurateur’s term for the way I like my steak cooked: charred on the outside, meltingly, quiveringly rare within. It is in the spirit of internationalism that I suggest this Korean style, in a soy, ginger and garlic marinade, and then thinly sliced so that you end up with a plateful of spice-seared, ruby-fleshed rags, the whole both scorched and tender.
1 approx. 4cm-thick slice, cut from the top of the rump (approx. 1.5kg in weight)
for the marinade:
5 tablespoons soy sauce
3 garlic cloves, minced
2.5cm fresh ginger, minced
2 tablespoons sesame oil
2 teaspoons caster sugar
black pepper
4 spring onions, roughly chopped
Put the steak in a large freezer bag and add all the marinade ingredients. Tie the bag expelling any air, and squidge everything around before leaving in the fridge overnight (or even for a day or so), or for at least an hour at room temperature.
Grill on a viciously hot barbecue or on a griddle. I like to do not much more than blacken the outside (which means about 5 minutes per side) but you, of course, should cook this just as long as you like. Leave to stand for a few minutes before carving into thin slices.
I love to eat these red, savoury, straggly slices mounded on plain steamed rice, wodged into buns with a splodge of brown sauce or piled into the centre of a Chinese-pancake-thin soft flatbread, drizzled with some of the Vietnamese Dipping Sauce and rolled up to form slaveringly dripping wraps.
Serves 4.