Marinate your steak in this glorious bath of buttermilk, garlic, rosemary and pepper for a tender and delicious supper. Hurray for buttermilk grilled steak!
So, let’s talk about buttermilk grilled steak. One of my favorite, favorite, favorite recipes on this here site is the one for buttermilk grilled chicken, and I’ve gotten lots of emails from folks telling them that it is their favorite way to make grilled chicken too.
(It gives me such a warm fuzzy feeling to know that there’s a nice big posse of folks all united in their love of buttermilk grilled chicken.)
Anyway, I figured what’s good for the chicken might be good for the steak as well. It couldn’t hurt to try, right? Yep. It definitely didn’t hurt.
What is Buttermilk?
Don’t be scared, but buttermilk is actually milk that has been fermented, which means that lactic acid has been added to milk to give it the thick, slightly sour taste and texture that is buttermilk.
It’s similar to the way yogurt is made, and like yogurt it is actually pretty good for you! It’s loaded with good probiotics, and while it might not be something you want to drink straight from the carton, it is an amazing, tenderizing ingredient for everything from pancakes to, yep, buttermilk steak!
In the case of this steak, the buttermilk joins forces with some rosemary and garlic to serve up the tenderest steak ever.
And by rosemary I mean the fresh stuff. It’s glorious!
ingredients you need to make buttermilk grilled steak
Here’s how you make glorious buttermilk grilled steak!
STEP 1: Mix up some buttermilk, a few cloves of mashed up garlic and some rosemary stalks that you have rolled between your hands until they are crushed and the aroma of rosemary oil is wafting through my kitchen.
STEP 2: Grind in a generous amount of pepper, pour everything into a zippered plastic bag, pop in a flank or sirloin steak and go about your day for the next 8 hours or so.
STEP 3: When suppertime rolls around, fire up the grill, pop the steak on the grill (discarding the marinade) and grill over high heat for 5 minutes per side, which makes the steak come out on the medium rare side the way we like it. If you like yours rarer, take it down by a minute per side – if you like it more well done, leave in on for a minute or two more per side.
STEP 4: Now comes the hard part. Put it on a cutting board, put some foil over it, and leave it alone for at least 5 minutes. I know you want to dig right in, but if you do all those delicious steak juices are going to run right out onto your cutting board. If you let it rest, a lot of them will stay inside the steak where you want them.
Has it been five minutes? Okay, slice!
more tips for making buttermilk grilled steak!
It’s usually right near the cream in the dairy section of your supermarket. Either low-fat or non-fat will work just fine.
You can if it is a Rosemary Emergency, but I promise that using fresh rosemary will take the flavor to a whole new level. You can usually find bunches of fresh rosemary right in the produce section.
You bet! The longer you marinate, the better.
Leave your question in the comments section below and I promise to answer pronto!
The steak will taste lightly of rosemary and garlic and pepper, and the buttermilk will have tenderized it perfectly. I used a shell steak for this, but a flank or a sirloin steak would also be ideal for this recipe…any cut of steak that benefits from marinating will be just fine.
Grilling Season Is Open For Business!
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Buttermilk Grilled Steak
Prep Time: 5 minutes- Marinating Time: 8 hours
- Cook Time: 10 minutes
- Total Time: 8 hours 15 minutes
- Yield: 4 servings 1x
- Category: Dinner
- Method: Grill
- Cuisine: American
- Diet: Gluten Free
Prep Time:
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Print Recipe
Pin RecipeIngredients
- One 1 1/2 to 2 pound steak (shell, flank and sirloin all work well for this recipe)
- 2 cups buttermilk
- 4 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
- 4 fresh rosemary sprigs, rolled between your palms to crush the leaves
- Fresh ground pepper
Instructions
- Combine buttermilk, garlic and rosemary. Grind in a generous amount of pepper. Pour into a zippered plastic bag.
- Add the steak to the bag, seal and turn it over a few times to make sure the steak is coated. Place in fridge for at least 8 hours, or overnight.
- Heat grill to high. Grill steak for 4-5 minutes per side for medium rare.
- Transfer steak to cutting board, cover with foil and let rest for 5 minutes before slicing and serving.
Looks splendid. How do you clean your wooden cutting board of steak juice?
Lots and lots of hot water and dish soap. Better safe than sorry!
You don’t need to clean a cutting board because you should be serving the steak whole after resting it. The reason the cutting board is covered in juices from the meat is because it was unnecessarily sliced into slivers allowing the meat to rapidly cook & the juices to quickly leak out.
Allowing the meat to rapidly cool sorry, not cook. Unfortunately there’s no edit comment function.
Hi Matt and thanks for all the input! I tend to go back and forth in terms of slicing steak or serving it “whole,” depending on what I am using it for. I find that resting it under foil for 5 minutes or so keeps in a lot of those juices, and sometimes (like when I am using steak for a steak salad) I will drizzle any extra over the top. Also depending on the recipe, it tends to make the steak easier for folks to deal with on the plate. And last but not least, for purposes of the blog, some readers find it helpful to see what the steak should look like on the inside once it is cooked. That being said, I’m all for freedom of choice when it comes to slicing or not – whether piping hot or cooled off a bit, it’s still scrumptious. Glad to see my recipes are making it to Australia – a place I’ve always wanted to visit! :)
I always balk at recipes that use buttermilk, because I hate buying a quart only to use a cup or so. Then I found buttermilk powder that can be reconstituted as needed! This looks great, and I’ll be trying it soon.
I always use any leftover buttermilk to make ricotta cheese. But that powder IS handy!
MMM. The 2104 grilling season??
Always good to plan ahead. :)
That looks delicious! Oh and the juice, awesome! It is truly such a waste to just have the juice all over the cutting board instead in your mouth, lol. Thanks for the great post and recipe.
Can’t waste a drop of those delicious juices!
Your pictures are awesome and thank you so much for creating a printable recipes. It is so useful to be able to print and refer to it in my backyard. Mind sharing how you are able to create the printable recipes on your site?
Have you ever mairinaded it for less than 8 hrs? I want to make this today but only have 4 hrs to marinate….
Oh gosh, and I hope I’m getting back to you in time! Four hours should be okay – the longer the better of course, but that will be long enough to get some of the tenderness!
these steaks looks awesome kate
thanks for posting
i will try it soon
This is an amazing recipe. Have to it out this season
this is really insane and amazing! can i have little more info about indian food? thanks
Shoul I wipe the steak before grilling. Do I just dump the marinate or can I make a sauce with it
★★★★★
Hi Paul! I usually DO pat steak dry before I grill it, but I don’t in this case because I want a little of the char and taste the marinade will give it. I have never tried making a sauce out of the marinade, and actually I think it might be too sour with the buttermilk, but if you try it let me know how it turns out and I will add it to the recipe! :)
Waiting 5 mins before slicing and eating was super hard! I just wanted to eat it there and then!
★★★★★
Nathan! I can totally relate – that is always the hardest part of cooking any steak recipe…the waiting! Hope you loved it! :)
This recipe is the best! Absolutely love the flavor.
So glad you like it!
That looks delicious. I will try this recipe soon. Are gas grills perfect for this recipe?
Yep, all kinds of grills are perfect for this recipe!
Woooow…..Homemade!!! It’s the only thing that taste good! And so easy to do…
I think I will look for these and try your recipe this weekend. Thank you for sharing!
Dang Thai from Embeya!
So glad you like it!
Those images are making me hungry again. I am going to try this for sure.
Glad to hear it!
I appreciate your recipe. I buttermilk chicken steak.
delicious! this is really insane and amazing!
Its kind of really tempting me to make the dish and try it
★★★★★
You never slice a steak before serving it. What’s the point of cooking a juicy steak & then resting it only to cut it into thin slivers so that it cools quickly & all of the juices leak out? I’ve never been able to understand this American obsession with destroying a good steak by slicing it into slivers before serving it instead of leaving it whole so that it stays warm & the juices remain where they belong; inside the steak instead of in a puddle at the bottom of the plate. Here in Australia we leave our steaks whole. If you served an Australian a pre sliced steak anywhere they’d tell you to take it back, redo it & leave it whole because grown adults grew out of needing someone to cut their food into little pieces for them when they were toddlers.
Hi Kate, That looks delicious. Let me try it for me. Awesome!
★★★★★
Thanks Ryan – hope you love it!