St. Louis Pork Steaks

I’ve asked myself why I’d never heard of these St. Louis Pork Steaks before. What is this giant cut of glossy grilled goodness that has evaded us for so long?
After all, I’ve lived in the adjacent state for darn-near thirty-plus years so how have they escaped me?
Several years ago, our son Chris married the lovely Stacy, who hails from Missouri and her dad lives in St. Louis. The first time he cooked for us, he made us these St. Louis Pork Steaks and we completely went nuts for them.
When he first mentioned them I thought, “pork STEAKS?” I’d never heard of pork and steak mentioned in the same phrase before.
The origins of pork steaks are sketchy because of different claims, but it’s said that someone asked their butcher to cut up (about one-half inch thick) the pork butt (or Boston butt), which strangely enough, has nothing to do with that part of the anatomy of a pig. It actually comes from the shoulder and the bone that runs through them is the shoulder bone.
Apparently they are as common in St. Louis as the St. Louis ribs are. In St. Louis there are two theories of cooking them – the first being simply seasoned with a quick flash over a grill, then brushed with BBQ sauce at the tail end of cooking them. The second, which I haven’t tried yet sounds equally as interesting – grill the steaks, lay them in a pan, cover with beer and a tomato-heavy BBQ sauce and cook them low-and-slow for an hour or so to make them super tender.
In the words of that one lady, “Ain’t nobody got time for that!”
ANYWAY, now we in Oklahoma love them. I hadn’t even seen them in a store, (or perhaps I just didn’t know what they were), but now they are showing up in our grocery stores and even at Aldi.
Let me tell you how we cook them.
We let them set out to take the chill out of them for 15-30 minutes and then season them up. Don’t be shy seasoning meat. It needs a heavy hand!
Next, we grill them for just a few minutes per side and then brush them with our favorite BBQ sauce.
We probably should be loyal to the St. Louis Pork Steaks origins and use Maull’s BBQ sauce which is the tradition in Missouri, but since it’s Oklahoma, we use Head Country, because…well, it’s that good and it always gets center stage in our refrigerator.
You know what would be fantastic with these St. Louis Pork Steaks? This Sweet Potato Salad.
Now matter what you have, you’ll enjoy these! Thank you St. Louis for gifting us with this deliciousness. It’s a keeper for life!
- 4 pork steaks
- 2 t. kosher salt
- 1 t. fresh black pepper
- 1 t. oregano
- 1 t. garlic powder
- ½ c. bbq sauce
- Preheat outdoor grill to medium
- Allow steaks to rest out of refrigerator for 15-30 minutes
- Mix together salt, pepper, oregano, and garlic powder
- sprinkle over both sides of steaks (you can let marinate for another 15 minutes at this point)
- Grill steaks 3-4 minutes per side
- Just before pulling off grill brush with bbq sauce on one side, flip and grill one minute
- Brush other side with bbq sauce and grill one minute on that side
