Best Steak For Fajitas
Classic Tex Mex, fajitas (pronounced fah-hee-tas) are typically made with grilled strips of skirt steak with onions and bell peppers, and served sizzling hot with fresh tortillas, guacamole, sour cream, and salsa. You can make fajitas with steak or chicken, or even make it plain vegetarian. Here’s a quick and easy recipe for steak fajitas.
Beef Steak Fajitas Recipe
PrintIngredients
- 1 Tbsp vegetable oil
- 1 lb of flank steak, skirt steak or carne asada
- 1 large yellow onion, peeled and sliced with the grain, not against the grain as one would normally slice an onion. Slice first in half, and then slice off sections a half inch wide at widest point.
- 2-3 bell peppers of various colors, stemmed, seeded, de-ribbed, sliced lengthwise into strips
- Salt
Steak Fajita Marinade:
- Juice of 1 lime
- 2 Tablespoons of olive oil
- 2 cloves garlic, peeled, minced
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1/2 fresh Jalapeño pepper, seeded, ribs removed, finely chopped (be careful not to touch your eyes or anywhere near your eyes after handling a Jalapeño pepper!)
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro, including stems
Method
1 Marinate the steak: Mix all marinade ingredients. Coat the steak with the marinade and let it sit at room temperature for an hour, or longer in the fridge. Before you cook the meat, wipe off most of the marinade and sprinkle the steak with salt.
2 Sear the steak on both sides: Set a large cast iron pan or griddle over high heat and let this heat up for 1-2 minutes. Add the tablespoon of oil to the pan and let this heat up for 1 minute. Add the steak, frying on each side for 3 minutes, or to desired doneness. 3 minutes per side will yield approximately medium rare doneness for an average cut of flank steak.
Carne asada and skirt steak will need less time. If the pan starts to smoke too much, reduce the heat to medium-high. You want the steak browned, not burned.
Remove from pan and let sit, tented with foil, for 5 minutes.
3 Cook the vegetables while the meat is resting. Add a little more oil to the pan if necessary, then add the onions and bell peppers. Let these sear for 1 minute before stirring, then stir every 90 seconds or so as the veggies sear. Cook for 5-6 minutes total.
4 Slice the meat across the grain into thin slices. If you slice the meat at an angle, you will be able to get your slices pretty thin. These cuts of steak are flavorful but can be a little tough, so thin slices will really help make it easier to eat.
5 Serve immediately with shredded cheese, salsa, shredded iceberg lettuce, sour cream, guacamole and warm flour tortillas. (Hint for warming tortillas - put in microwave over a paper towel for 20 seconds on high heat.)
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Elise Bauer is the founder of Simply Recipes. Elise launched Simply Recipes in 2003 as a way to keep track of her family's recipes, and along the way grew it into one of the most popular cooking websites in the world. Elise is dedicated to helping home cooks be successful in the kitchen. Elise is a graduate of Stanford University, and lives in Sacramento, California.
Links:
Tequila Lime Chicken Fajitas - from Andrea's Recipes
Beef Fajita Nachos - from The Pioneer Woman
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This has one of the most authentic fajita marinades!
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Have made this recipe twice and it’s very good! I cheated a bit to make sure the steak was tender and used an extra NY Strip we had in the freezer and cut it into strips first and then seared quickly. Didn’t have a jalapeno so used some red pepper flakes.
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I made this for a group of my best ladies. It was delicious. I grilled the steak on the bbq! Wonderful. Will definitely make this again!
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Really good. I use my toaster oven to quickly heat my tortillas. In a pinch I have put the mixture into a warm pita bread…if no tortillas in the house. I like pickled jalepenos on them too.
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I have made this several times since coming across the recipe. I tweak it a little as I am a garlic and salt lover. So I dont follow it exactly to a T. But every time I make it for company, they ask for the recipe. I’ve been told its restaurant quality type food from everyone. It is by far my favorite steak fajita recipe, even if I modified it to my taste a little, without it I never would have enjoyed fajitas as much ad I do now, nor would my family or company. love it!
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