Skirt Steak with Compound Butter

The easiest way to make compound butter is to mince all the flavorings and then cream them and the butter together with a fork, just as you would butter and sugar in making a cake. But if your butter is ice-cold (or frozen), use a small food processor to combine all the ingredients quickly; there will be some waste here, as you’ll never get all the butter out of the container and blade, but the process will take just seconds. Skirt steak, the long, thin band of wonderfully marbled muscle (actually the cow’s diaphragm), was not easy to get even a couple of years ago but is now almost ubiquitous. It ranges as high as ten dollars a pound, but can often be found for well under half that, especially at supermarkets. It’s a moist, juicy steak, but not exactly tender—a little chewier than good strip steak—and does not respond well to overcooking. If someone insists on having it cooked beyond medium-rare, take no responsibility.