Elevate Your Steak With A Couple Of Splashes Of This Sauce

When it's served au naturel, beef steak should be creamy and buttery, with a deep, rich taste (our mouths are watering just describing it). There are lots of ingredients that will complement and enhance that flavor, whether you're preparing a top-of-the-line cut or one that's cheaper but tastes expensive. You can keep it simple with a grind of salt and some butter or olive oil ... or you can get creative and reach for hoisin sauce. It has the sweetness of a honey marinade, but the dark, rich addition of hoisin brings some serious tang while also packing a deeply savory punch. Depending on your personal preference, splashing a little hoisin on your steak (or a lot) will do much to elevate it, though that's not the only way to use this sauce.

Although it's most often used as a finishing sauce — think of it as a kind of Chinese ketchup — hoisin sauce makes for a delicious steak marinade. Cover the meat with it and leave it in the fridge for up to 24 hours to let the hoisin work its magic. Gustavo Tosta (aka Guga Foods) marinated a prime piece of aged beef in hoisin for two months in his fridge and was wowed by the results. You don't have to be a steak lover to get the benefits, either. Hoisin pairs brilliantly with chicken, seafood, and noodles, and because it's normally plant-based, vegetarians and vegans don't have to miss out on all the flavorsome fun either.

We can often trace the history of particular foods, such as the underrated veggie beloved by high-society Victorians or the sweet treat that delighted cowboys back in the day. But the origins of hoisin aren't so much shrouded in the mists of time as nonexistent. The Chinese word for seafood gives us the name, while it appears to be a Cantonese invention, but beyond those scant facts, not much else is known. Perhaps that explains why there's no single, authoritative recipe for hoisin.

You can buy bottles of hoisin sauce, which vary in thickness and flavor depending on added ingredients, such as cilantro or lemon, but it's also simple to whip up at home and customize for your particular steak. You need fermented black bean paste, red miso, or soybean paste, as well as garlic, vinegar, sugar, chili, and Chinese five spice, though some recipes include fresh ginger and peanut butter, among other ingredients. If you want, corn starch will thicken your hoisin sauce (and give your steaks the best sear before grilling), while everything can be adjusted to your personal taste. Pop your homemade hoisin sauce in a jar and it will keep in your fridge for about a week, compared to 12 to 18 months for a store-bought bottle.