TENDERNESS: moderately tender
GRAIN: loose, coarse, across the width
FAT: moderately fatty
KEY FEATURES: bold taste, very textured, rather engorged
© 2018 by Rob Firing
Years ago, on an unseasonably warm day in October, I found myself milling around one of my favourite butcher shops in Toronto, scheming how I might take full advantage of the weather and reawaken my fire pit for one last spectacular grill-up.
I came home with two big hanger steaks, which I’d had only once before, in a restaurant. These two were deeply red and adorned with patches of loose fat, reminding me of the amply fatted lamb meat I would use for traditional souvlaki. Oregano, garlic, grated onion, salt, and lemon juice informed a marinade, and a few hours later I served what I thought was the best souvlaki I had ever tasted: crispy bits of savoury crust and herbal, peppery, juicy chunks of bold-tasting meat.
Hanger steaks are so called because they literally hang off the side of the carcass as it is hung. Whole and untrimmed, they are about the size of a small loaf of bread. By the time we see them in a butcher’s case, they are cut lengthwise into two long, floppy steaks, with the tough nerve tissue removed from the middle. They are generally much cheaper than prime cuts, even though there are just two trimmed hangers (four steaks) per animal.
Hanger steaks have large, loose fibres, with the grain running across the steak. At times, I have been surprised by how tender a well-aged hanger steak can be, to the point where I could ignore the direction of the grain and simply grill it with a little salt rub, then slice it willy-nilly or serve it whole. But they are not always that way. A truly tender hanger will yield to your pinch when it is raw, and you could tear it apart easily if you wanted to. Most of the time, though, these steaks are not so soft, and you need to take care to carve them across the grain or tenderize them with a marinade. I don’t mind a bit of a chew, but even so, I’ve been disappointed when I’ve been inattentive to their particular characters.
The muscle that gives hanger steaks their uniquely bold taste is rather engorged, as hangers are adjacent to a cow’s internal organs. This makes the meat prone to poaching and becoming rubbery if grilled too slowly, and the steaks turn out much better when cooked in the dry environment of an open grill rather than pan-fried. The best approach is to cook them on a hot grill until medium-rare. Too rare and hanger steaks will not give up their full potential. Over medium-rare and they become dull and chewy. With these caveats in mind, a properly cooked hanger steak, bursting with rustic, meaty flavour and hearty texture, will inspire you all through the grilling season, right up to the winds of November.