Labor Day 2015 ('Murrca!)

My cousin, who recently came to the United States for school, visited me for Labor Day this year.  We romped around the DC Metropolitan area for 3.5 days, eating amazing food, enjoying DC yuppie life, and even getting a little nature time outside of the city.

This being my cousin's first American Labor Day, I thought it would be fun to show her a simple American way to celebrate every summer holiday: slapping some meat on a grill.  Only, I tried to make it anything but simple.  Having two days to prepare, I capitalized on time as my primary resource and did some research into good marinades for steak.  I pulled ideas from various websites to come up with a savory garlic two-day marinade (based largely on this recipe).  And in order to ensure that the quality of the steak matched that of the marinade, I bought two three quarter pound rib eyes from Whole Foods.

The marinade was made with the following:

• 1/2 cup vinegar
• 1/4 cup soy sauce
• 1 entire head of garlic, minced
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 2 teaspoons black pepper
• 2 teaspoons cayenne pepper
• salt to taste

After one day, I flipped the steaks over in the marinade to ensure even soaking time.  Here is what the steaks looked like right after I put them on the grill (So. Much. Garlic.):

Here are the steaks after the flip.  I am still working on mastering the art of grill marks:

Here are the finished steaks:

They look a little darker because I let them cook a little longer to get to a medium-well finish.  Unfortunately, I did not do a good job with heat control, and I did not have a good grasp on the cut of meat itself.  The steaks turned out slightly overdone as a result, although the tenderness due to marination may have saved the day.

Overall, the flavor was slightly on the acidic side due to all the vinegar and lemon juice.  Next time, I would cut back drastically on the vinegar and add more lemon juice.  I would also use some Worcestershire sauce as the recipe linked above suggests (I did not have any on hand this time).

The only thing missing from this meal?  Some good ol' home baked American butter rolls, which I did not have any time to prepare.  So we went with a healthier carb option.