Mastering Marinades

When I first started cooking, I quickly learned I could cook well enough not to go hungry. However learning to cook so that I actually really enjoyed it, or where I felt accomplished enough to feed another human being didn't come until later.

One thing that I discovered that's one of my fave cooking tricks is cooking something where you use a marinade. I think of marinade as a flavored, pre-soak for meat that's about to be cooked. Actually, when it comes to things like tofu, a marinade is often the difference between "wow, this tastes incredibly like NOTHING!" and "hey, this is actually pleasant and yummy!" It also can help make lots of chicken dishes taste more varied from each other versus that much-remarked upon "hmmm, tastes like chicken" effect. I tend to use marinades more for grilling or stir-fry.

One of the coolest things I learned how to do recently was to use miso as a marinade for beef. You want a nice thick cut of meat, something that's thick and just right for broiling. For each person I like to estimate about 3/4 to one pound of beef.

Miso is a fermented soybean paste most often used in soups. The darker the miso, the more salty it tastes. For a lighter taste, you'll want to get a white miso. If you purposely want something that tastes stronger and saltier, get a yellow or red miso.

All you need to do is coat the beef with the miso, almost like a layer of frosting all over, and refrigerate covered for 12-24 hours. When it comes time to cook, you then wipe off the miso and slide the meat into the broiler for about 20-25 minutes. It's done when the outside is nice and crusty and the inside is still very pink.