I’m not the meatiestย of carnivores. ย I’m in it for the toppings.
I’m most interested in a steak when it is topped with a ludicrous amount of A-1 sauce and/or bleu cheese. ย Hamburgers with exactly toooo much cheddar cheese. ย Yes, please. ย I’ll sign up for lobsterย because of the clarified butter. ย And most everyย East LA taco truck is amazing because of its seasoning, sauce, and salsas.
Join me in saucing just aboutย anything and everything.
My refrigerator is filled with a menagerie of little jars filled with sweet, sour, and spicy sauce concoctions. ย Butter too… obviously lots of butter.
Steak is a special occasion in my refrigerator. ย Because it’s Summer. ย Because I’m experimenting with being a grown-up lady who grills over charcoal. ย Because I made a fancy-pants Homemade Steak Sauce… ย it’s a very special occasion. ย STEAK!
Serving suggestion: ย on grilled skirt steak, in abundance, like a BOSS.
The amazing thing about homemade steak sauce is that it’s much more than the sum of its parts.
Sure it’s ketchup and Worcestershire, beef broth, and a surprising amount of instant espresso powder… but it doesn’t taste specifically like any one of these ingredients. ย I think it might be a little bit of magic.
Onions and garlic are cooked down with a good amount of fresh parsley. ย The smell? ย YES!
Once the onion are cooked down we add ketchup, Worcestershire, ย beef broth, espresso powder (!!!), salt and pepper. ย The mixture simmers away, covered, for about fifteen minutes.
The onions are garlic with be extra soft and tender and the flavors will be mixed and melted into something exactly right!
The espresso powder, even though it’s totally unexpected, adds quite a lot to this sauce. ย How to attach words to the espresso powder flavor additions is challenging. ย It’s hard to describe. ย It adds depth and intrigue. ย Umami. ย Espresso powder is that special something that, in combination with the other ingredients, makes a sauce that doesn’t taste like coffee. ย Weird and perfect!
I grilled these skirt steaks in the rain which I ย think adds extra flavor to the meat, and extra bad-assedness to my grilling skills.
Or is it bad-assery?
This sauce is tangy, slightly sweet, earthy, and utterly delicious. ย Next time I might add extra heat with crushed red pepper flakes. ย It’s also delicious on chicken, grilled vegetables, and leftover steak and eggs. ย It’s also lovely to share with a neighbor, if you happen to be the friendly sort.
Adapted from The Lemonade Cookbook.
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Homemade Steak Sauce
- Prep Time: 0 hours
- Cook Time: 0 hours
- Total Time: 0 hours
- Yield: just over 1 cup 1x
Description
Steak and everything else sauce! Definitely don’t skip the espresso powder and add a bit of crushed red pepper flakes for added spice!
Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon canola oil
- 1 small onion, finely diced (about 3/4 cup)
- 2 garlic cloves, peeled and finely diced
- 1/4 cup fresh flat-leaf parsley, chopped
- 1/2 cup ketchup
- 3/4 cup beef broth (or water)
- 2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
- 2 teaspoons instant espresso powder
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- Heat oil in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Add onion and sautรฉ, stirring occasionally, for 3 minutes until the onions are softened and translucent. Add garlic and parsley and sautรฉ for 2 more minutes, until softened and fragrant.
- Add ketchup, broth or water, Worcestershire sauce, espresso powder, salt, and pepper. Reduce heat to low, cover, and simmer for 15 minutes stirring occasionally.
- Remove from heat and use an immersion blender to puree until smooth. If you don’t have an immersion blender you can carefully transfer the mixture to an upright blender, cover, and blend until smooth. Transfer to a clean mason jar and allow to rest until cooled to room temperature. Seal with a lid and store in the refrigerator. Serve on grilled steak. Sauce will last in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
38 Responses
Thank you for a great base recipe! I made it as directed and found it good but a bit bland. Put it back on the stove and added a splash of liquid smoke, blueberry balsamic vinegar, hot sauce and a pinch of ground cloves, (don’t know why, just seemed right). Fantastic. Thank you for giving me a great jumping off point to a recipe I will go back to. Keep up the good work!
I’m an absolute suckers for sauces… Ketchup and BBQ sauce in particular. I just recently made some BBQ sauce for my blog, and co-incidently I used almost the same recipe (I swear I never saw your recipe before) minus the espresso, parsley and Beef Stock. I’ll try it again, and this time with the items I didn’t add the first time. I have a couple of blogs that I look upto as inspiration for mine, and you are one of them.
I love how effortlessly gorgeous your pictures are. Though we have been having teeny weeny improvement in our blog pictures, we are still trying to find our style.
:)
I’ve got the same feelings (?) about meat as you, so I’m definitely gonna try this!
https://justsem.wordpress.com/
I am a huge condiment gal myself!! I want lots of condiments and I want extra of each one too! Steak with extra sauce, potato with extra butter and sour cream, salad with extra dressing, seafood with extra lemon and butter, and also like everything to have extra spice…I wanna be eating my meal going “whew, that’s spicy”…I cant wait to try this!! Thanks so much for the recipe!
Ooohhhh!!!!! My husband will love this! We also have a sauce laden fridge. I decided that the word is “bad-assery” it’s way more fun.
I have all the fixings for this at home except for the parsley – need to make this happen. Would be great for canning and giving away to fellow foodies as a gift!
I’m totally intrigued by the addition of the espresso powder! I have some in my cupboard so now I just need to get the steak.
Ooops, here ya go https://www.thesqueezeinn.com/
I totally get the toppings. Ya gotta see the cheese on this place in my hometown. I don’t get how they make the “cheese skirt” topping but it involves ice cubes and a dome lid. Seriously, just get me an order of a cheese skirt; they can keep the rest!
Looks delish! I, too, am all about the sauces. If a sandwich on a menu has aoli on it-I always order it, sometimes without looking to see what else it on it!
I am TOTALLY making this tonight! As an aside, thanks for switching up how the recipe is laid out – I always had problems printing directly from your website. (Not that it ever deterred me!)
OH MY GAAAWWWDDDD!!!!!
I love you so much Joy. You are an angel on Earth!
I love A1 and here in France it doesn’t exist.
I miss it so much. SOOOO much.
Thank you thank you thank you, from the bottom of my brie clogged heart.
You are the best.
Big hugs,
Hata
http://www.chicagotofrance.com
I totally understand you dousing lobster in clarified butter. The best food ever. I love a good bbq sauce with a steak. Intrigued to taste how espresso adapts the sauce so might be on the cards for Friday night date steak. Thanks!
I really need to learn how to can so I can make this recipe in the future. Sounds amazing and I love how it can easily be used on steak, chicken, etc. Thanks again!
This is going on my must-try list!
I like these ingredients together – I bet this is a winner!
‘Well I’ll Be Danged’ – Espresso Powder in steak sauce – – genius !! I can understand your difficulty is trying to explain exactly what is the Espresso Powder adds to the sauce because, just yesterday, I was trying to explain to someone what the addition of cocoa powder to a mole sauce adds in flavor… pretty much impossible to describe except to say ‘ depth of flavor’ and ‘IT MAKES IT TASTE BETTER!!! ‘ ; O )
I need to get a steak on the grill just for this sauce!
Do you think you could freeze this? I’d like to stash some for “emergencies”!
oh man this looks good. Think I’ll save this for our next barbecue! Thanks for sharing this Joy :)
Yes! Sauce on everything! A good sauce can make any meal amazing. This steak sauce is so different from my usual. I can’t wait to try it!
That looks so awesome! Also fries are just a vehicle for ketchup, just sayin
Will be making this steak sauce very soon. But what I really want to know is what is the green sauce pan you are using. We are needing to replace very old pans. Yours looked wonderful.
Thanks!
This looks insane. Nothing is better than a great homemade steak sauce… YUM. You can definitely use this on anything.
I’m a big fan of sauces, especially melted butter! Sauce on everything!! This looks fantastic and I also kind of want to dip a potato in that sauce. In addition to the steak, obvi.
This sauce sounds so delicious! I know it must be tasty!
i am a huge lover of steak sauce. eating steak is totally a vehicle for the sauce. this looks amazing.
I’m not a steak fan, but I wanna try this out with chicken! It sounds delicious!
xoxo
Taylor
Juice all you want. I’m taking up saucing.
English professor says bad-assery. 100%. also, on board with the espresso. now I want steak…
Whenever I think of steak sauce (which I do like), I think back to when my then vegan sister worked at a steakhouse, and swore she could tell how low her tip was going to be according to how people ordered their steak and what they put on it. Medium-rare and nothing? Great tip! Medium-well and steak sauce? 50-50 chance of a decent tip. Well-done and ketchup? You’re screwed. Might as well pour some water in their laps.
Truth.
This post made my morning. Visiting your site is always a delight. This steak sauce looks fantastic, especially with the expresso powder.
I love using steak sauce on vegetables! I will definitely try this recipe out. Thanks!
You made this for a boy. Don’t think I don’t know it! ;)
giiirrrlll. you crazy.
Yes condiments are the bomb! I have been dying to find a real steak sauce recipe. The addition of coffee is so unique too. Thanks joy!
Put this in a sandwich, and then put a fork in me, ’cause I’m done.