Are there any major differences between the two cuts? Is one a better selection for fajitas than the other?

Skirt is the traditional cut and what I always use. I've never had the other.

Skirt is fajitas. Anything else is just a cooking style. Inside is the best. Outside is fine.

I recommend

1) Loin Flap
2) Outer skirt
3) Inside skirt

Save the hanger for Steak Frites

fwiw Pappasitos uses outer skirt

[This message has been edited by drive on (edited 3/17/2012 10:34a).]

Um, drive on, I think you might be wrong on the 'Sito's information.

I could be, but, I'm not

From a Pappasitos general manager quoted in the San Antonio express news

quote:

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"A lot of other restaurants' take on the fajita is to order it pre-packaged from Sysco and to cook it on a gas grill," Shaw says. "We use an outside skirt steak, aged four to six weeks, while most restaurants use an inside skirt meat, which is an inferior cut of meat."

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The outside is the best, NOT the inside.

And Japan imports about 90% of everything we produce. So if you do buy skirt steak, chances are it is inside, which is inferior.

This is from 2009:

quote:

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. In 1988, the U.S.-Japan Beef and Citrus Agreement reclassified outside skirt, the cut that started the fajita craze, as tariff-free offal. The Japanese, who used to pay the equivalent of a 200 percent tariff on U.S. beef, now buy our outside skirt steak with no tariff at all. They are currently importing 90 percent of it.

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[This message has been edited by crag (edited 3/18/2012 7:39p).]

Agree with Don Cecilio, the inside is best, particularly where it is the thickest. The outside is sometimes percieved to be "better" due to the fact that it is thicker and after trimming and tenderizing it renders a longer and thicker cut of meat that is now known as fajita. Both the inside and the outside were/are called fajitas, but the inside portion is smaller and thus less of it out there. The outside was cheaper and requires more work to get it really tasty, but there is more of it.

FYI, Pappasitos, Lupe Tortilla, and all the chains use good meat, but they run their fajitas, whatever they might be, through the tenderizer a couple of times. With the outside thicker skirt you have to if you want it tender, with the inside cut you really don't have to.

It has been my experience that skirt and flank get mixed up some in the pursuit of fajitas. I am of the opinion, and where the fajita cut or style came from, that the "arrachera" cut of meat makes the most consistently best fajitas as you usually get both some skirt and flank and the flank when cut into arracheras is more tender and juicier.

quote:

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So if you do buy skirt steak, chances are it is inside, which is inferior.

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This isn't accurate on either account. Inside is much more difficult to find. If you buy skirt, it's likely outside.

See RGV above.

Yes, what I said is 100% accurate on both accounts.

You can't get outside skirt anymore because of the high demand by the Japanese. And it is in demand because it is the better cut.

Google it.

quote:

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With outside skirt in short supply, Texas meat companies have compensated by offering some new fajita cuts to restaurants. In fact, the Texas A&M Meat Science section is working on fajita replacements

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http://www.houstonpress.com/content/printVersion/1305691/

[This message has been edited by crag (edited 3/18/2012 10:41a).]

OK, on the supply, I didn't know that.

However, my experience over right at 40 years of cooking fajitas is that inside is better for the reasons RGV listed. I never tenderize. This goes back to the days it was 70 cents per pound and butchers typically ground it into dog food!

[This message has been edited by cecil77 (edited 3/18/2012 11:35a).]

Cecil back on another fajita thread proving that experience is no indicator that someone knows what they're doing

What's in that marinade again

Kraft BBQ Sauce.....

[This message has been edited by drive on (edited 3/18/2012 4:10p).]

I would encourage everyone to read the article I posted. Great info!

Lots of restaurants, like Joe T. Garcia's in Fort Worth and Matt's Rancho Martinez in Dallas, now use tenderloin in their fajitas; one uses select cut and the other uses ungraded.

quote:

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"I like Sonny Falcon, I went to school with him. But he didn't invent fajitas," said Liborio "Libo" Hinojosa, whose family owns H&H Meat Products in Mercedes, one of the Valley's biggest meat suppliers. "The Lion Mart in Brownsville was selling fajitas at their meat counter way before 1969."

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This is my ex-girlfriends uncle, her dad was one of the owners of H&H, and they were big time pushers of fajitas back in the day. We dated and lived together for like 9 years, so I learned a bunch about meat, with a Tex-Mex twist. Before the big break up we would have an 18 wheeler pull up to the house and off load boxes of ribeyes, tenderloins, and oh so special INSIDE skirt steak every couple of weeks. The prime fajitas they basically kept for family and one or two accounts and they were the best I have ever had.

quote:

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I was surprised to see outside skirt steak, but as my brother pointed out, it was imported. In a bizarre trade swap, we sell our outside skirt to Asia and then import outside skirt from Central America. When we opened the package, we were taken aback by the nasty liver odor. "It always smells like that," Dave said. Because of the smell, I decided to omit the outside skirt steak.

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Man, I just don't know that was not my experience nor do I agree with this. When we lived in Nicaragua I was able to get a butcher to cut me skirt steak, and it was excellent. Whenever I am there I usually bring back 4 or 5 tenderloins as they are about $5.50 a pound and are way, way good. Not quite as good as the prime ones here, but the price difference makes up for that in my opinion.

Beef in Mexico and Central America is grass fed, it is tougher and less marbled, but to me the better cuts have more taste to them than what we get in the US. I was also raised on it, so I am probably jaded. I know one of the only things my gringa mom complained about was "tough ass Mexican beef".

In terms of eateries calling tenderloin "fajitas", more power to them. But to me that will just be grilled tenderloin tacos. Fajita should be the skirt steak and possibly the thin part of the flank steak, it should also be served as a slab, so you can do your own cutting of it, unless it is cut at a personal bbq pit (I am a fajita purist I guess).

In South Texas and Northern Mexico there are two schools of preference, those that prefer the "arracheras" (if you have not tried them, do so and also try the aguja nortena) and those that prefer "fajitas". Personally I like arracheras better, but mama and daughter like fajitas more so that is what we go with. I have not seen any shortage of fajitas or arracheras down here or in Mexico, but the price is way high.

I am not as old as Don Cecilio, but I remember plenty of $1.49-$1.79 a pound fajitas in the 80's.

Crag:
Oh, thanks for posting that article, it was an interesting read for sure.

Inside skirt steak is going from $3.69 - $6 per pound in the Houston area. I just can't understand paying over $4lb for it. Maybe that's just me.

Drive on, have you tried 1 part Kraft BBQ sauce with one part beer (with some Worcestershire) ?

If not, save the snark for somebody else. I've season and marinated them in many, many different ways. The sauce mixture is the one I personally prefer. It ain't the only way.

And to reinforce RGV, if it's not skirt, it's not fajitas. Fajitas is a cut of meat, not a style of preparation. You may as well say that some restaurants are now using round steak in their Filet Mignon.

[This message has been edited by cecil77 (edited 3/18/2012 9:36p).]

Don Cecilio:

I agree with some Kraft BBQ sauce, I use it sometimes as a base when I marinate fajitas. I also prefer Kraft in terms of flavor, again maybe I grew to like it too much as when I was a kid in Mexico it was THE ONLY BBQ sauce available there. Ironically when we were in Nicaragua for almost 4 years it was the only one there and due to that and the Nicaraguan propensity for chicken I grew fond of using it on BBQ chicken, which I never really did when I lived in the states.

A quick marinade that I use frequently for fajitas is a thick plop of kraft BBQ sauce, two big squirts of cheap Italian dressing, some beer and lime juice, a couple of good shakes of Maggi sauce (I prefer it to worst. sauce), some seasoned salt. Right before cooking I dust with Goya Adobo and Fiesta Fajita seasoning mix.

Many times I don't marinate, I just lightly rub or season with Cajun Seasoning, Fiesta mix, crushed garlic and adobo and use lime while cooking. The key is good fajita meat, as we have said. Also, cooked over all mesquite wood burned down to coals adds great flavor. In terms of BBQ I prefer hickory smoke flavor, but grilling a steak or fajitas the mesquite wood makes it taste great.

One other note, in terms of fajitas. Fresh home made pico de gallo with lots of lime and crispy onion makes a big difference. Key to me is the tortillas, home made fresh off the comal is tops, if not really, really good corn ones make a difference. Too thick flour tortillas seem to dull the taste of a really good taco.

Corn tortillas, thick and fresh off the comal, but still soft. I like mine to have an almost mealy texture. I like to taste the corn.

Pico: diced fresh tomatos, diced fresh jalapenos, diced fresh onion, fresh cilantro, lime. The proportions don't really matter, right? When we make it, it's in a really, really big bowl and we makes lots of it.

Don Cecilio:
Man, that sounds good. Any tortilla just off the comal is a good one, but I don't like my corn too thick. I know the mealy consistency you are talking about, it is like the med-rare of corn tortillas and I like it too. If they are too over done they get brittle and a little bitter. A good corn tortillas has some lime, like in the powder not the juice, in it. That is why the Mexican tortilleria tortillas are so good, porque tienen tantita cal (cal=lime in Spanish).

As I have mentioned, I have spent about 38 years out of 44 living along the Rio Grande or south of the Rio Grande. In all those years I have never grown to just love cilantro like most people. I like a smattering of it, just a little bit. I will usually pick it out of my pico to a degree. I use it sparingly in beans.

I like culantro, which is similar to cilantro, much better as it does not have as strong a taste.

FYI, I am convinced that in Mexico and the southern third world in general that a large % of the cause of Montezumas revenge is cilantro. In many parts of Mexico it is grown in very wet patches, like where sewers drain and stuff and stagnant water gathers. Then it is likely not washed well. I avoid it if I did not clean it myself. I won't usually eat it on street tacos either due to this. I digress.

Yeah, well think how fat we'd all be if we actually digested all that good food!

Inside or outside skirt meat hands down.

"It is better to trust in the LORD than to put confidence in man," Psalm 118:8.

AGZ:

Kinda late to add this in on this thread. I didn't know that the English term for "Arrachera" is Hanging Tender. I had no idea as I always buy them or ask for them as Arrachera as I do most of my shopping way down south.

IMO, the "Hanging Tender" makes wonderful fajitas and to me is the only other cut other than a true fajita that can be called a fajita as it comes from where the skirt and flank meet if I am not mistaken. As mentioned, I prefer to grill these, but the wife and daughter prefer fajitas.

Don Cecilio:

The only reason I noted this today was that I had to trip to HEB for the wifa and as I walking down the meat isle I glanced at some "arracheras" and saw them bilingual labeling as "arrachera/hanging tenders". I would have never thunk that hanging tenders were arrachera, ni idea.

Whenever I cookout for friends and such I usually do half fajitas and half arracheras with some agujas thrown in. Mexican arrachera is really good, due to the feeding of it and it is tougher, but tastier.

I should have been more clear. When I saw the ad, hanging tender was the English translation for arrachera. Thanks for the info!

[This message has been edited by Agz_2003 (edited 3/25/2012 4:44p).]