A Restaurant Trick

We’ve all been there – your at your favorite steakhouse, you bite into your glistening steak and it’s beyond flavorful. Wonder how they do it? BUTTER. This recipe includes a compound butter that allows you to get creative with ingredients, adding rosemary, lemon zest or garlic. The compound butter takes 1 hour to chill so you might want to make that first. Butter is also added to the pan as you cook to give them that pretty shine. An important tip is to always make sure your steaks are at room temperature before you cook them, and they are very dry.

Seared Steaks with Herb Butter Recipe

Seared Steaks with Herb Butter   Save Print Ingredients

• Steaks:
• 4 6-ounce New York strip steaks
• sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1 tablespoon canola oil
• Compound Butter: These are just the ingredients I used for this particular butter. Like I said earlier, you could add in minced garlic, lemon zest, oregano, or any other herbs that you like.
• 2 tablespoons flat-leaf parsley, minced
• 1 teaspoon thyme leaves, chopped
• 1 teaspoon chives, minced
• ½ teaspoon fresh lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon sea salt
• 4 ounces (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
• ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Instructions

1. Allow steaks to rest at room temperature for 30 minutes. This is a good time to go ahead and pull out the butter as well to allow it to soften. Pat the steaks dry with a paper towel and season generously on all sides with salt and pepper.
2. For the compound butter:
3. In a small bowl, add parsley, thyme, chives, lemon juice, salt, pepper and butter. Mix to combine, and then place mixture on plastic wrap or parchment paper. Roll it up into a log and chill in the fridge for about an hour.
4. Place 1 tablespoon of the butter and oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat until the butter foams. Once the foams calms down, its time to add 2 of the steaks. Note that once you place the steaks in the skillet, do not move them! Add the steaks in the skillet and sear until the steaks are a deep down on one side, about 5 minutes.
5. Using tongs, turn the steaks over, toss in the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter, and sear for another 3-4 minutes. Using a large spoon, baste the steaks with the melted butter so that its well covered. Finish cooking the steaks to your desired doneness. I love using a meat thermometer, so if you have one definitely use this. Insert into the thickest part of the steak and look for 135°F which is medium rare. Medium – 140°F, and medium-well is 150°F. I like my steak medium-well so I took it out of the skillet at 147°F as the steak will continue to cook as it rests. Remove steaks when done and place on a cutting board. Loosely cover with foil and let them rest for 5 minutes.
6. To serve: You will notice in my photo I didn’t cut the steak into strips which was just fine.
7. Carve the steak against the grain into ½ inch strips (which means in the opposite direction of the little wrinkles). Slice your delicious compound butter into ½ inch disks and place on top of the steak and let butter melt!