This delicious cowboy butter recipe is quick and easy to make, and enhances any simple steak (and mashed potatoes, too!) Try this cowboy steak butter with smoked ribeyes or your favorite cut of meat!
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If you haven't tried cowboy steak butter, you're missing out! This tasty steak sauce is an absolute flavor bomb and can be whipped up in minutes! While this cowboy butter recipe is incredible with red meat, it's also delicious with smoked chicken thighs, seafood, roasted veggies, rice, potatoes, and more!
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😍 Why You'll Love This Recipe
- This cowboy steak butter can be prepared in advance and served whenever you're ready!
- Simple ingredients are all you need to get a complex, unique steak butter!
- While this cowboy butter recipe is ideal for steak, it can also be paired with chicken, shrimp, pasta, green beans, and more!
🔖 Ingredients & Substitutions
- Butter: I like to use a salted Irish butter because of its high quality and flavor, but regular butter will do. You can use unsalted butter if you prefer to have control over the amount of salt.
- Mustard: Stone-ground mustard, or Dijon mustard (typically used in cowboy butter).
- Fresh herbs: I use fresh chives, fresh parsley, and fresh cilantro. Many recipes use fresh thyme instead of cilantro, so feel free to swap them if you don't like cilantro. Terragon would make another great addition.
- Lemon: Lemon juice is a necessity (although lime would work as well), and lemon zest is optional.
- Spices: Cayenne pepper, black pepper, smoked paprika, and smoked salt (or sea salt).
- Calabrian chili peppers: You can get these crushed chili peppers in a jar from Amazon or specialty grocery stores, or use crushed red pepper flakes as an alternative.
*See recipe card for full list of ingredients.
🧈 How To Make Cowboy Steak Butter
Step 1: Melt butter over low heat, then add minced garlic and shallots; toast until fragrant. Mix in mustard, lemon juice, lemon zest, cayenne, Calabrian chilies, smoked paprika, smoked salt, and black pepper, then stir to combine. Remove from heat and mix in chopped herbs.
Pro Tip: Toasting the fresh garlic and shallot adds complexity to the flavor, but if you'd like to avoid using the stove altogether, you can simply mix all of the ingredients with softened butter.
Step 2: Drizzle over steak, and enjoy!
🍽️ Serving Suggestions
There are so many ways to use this versatile cowboy butter recipe! Here are some ideas to get you started.
Drizzle it over steak, mashed potatoes, oven roasted tri-tip, Treager carne asada, roasted rainbow carrots, tacos de adobada, instant pot Mexican rice, and more.
This sauce is also terrific with roasted veggies, chicken, pork, and seafood such as lobster, crab, or grilled prawns.
You can also use cowboy steak butter as a dipping sauce for smoked jalapeno poppers or panko shrimp, or spread it over buffalo burgers and tri-tip sandwiches.
🤷🏻♀️ Recipe FAQs
Cowboy butter gets its name from the earthy, herbaceous, slightly spicy rustic flavors used to make it. It isn't a recipe that traces its roots back to the Old West, but you just know that if a cowboy could try it, he'd love it!
The combination of zesty mustard, rustic herbs and spices, and bright, acidic lemon juice is what gives cowboy steak butter that bold, distinct flavor!
Sure, as long as you're okay with changing the flavor profile! You can omit it or replace it with an alternative like tahini paste or horseradish.
👩🏻🍳 Pro Tips
- You can enjoy this cowboy butter recipe right off the stove like a sauce, or you can let it solidify in the fridge for a more spreadable texture.
- When the cowboy steak butter is melted, it will separate. If you want a more consistent, creamy texture, you can simply mix the ingredients with room-temperature butter and skip the stove entirely.
- For a beautiful presentation, you can pour the liquid butter into a butter mold before refrigerating. You can also roll room-temperature butter into a log using parchment paper.
- Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 week. After that, freeze for up to 6 months.
- You can reheat cowboy steak butter over low heat on the stove or in the microwave in 15-second bursts until it melts.
🥩 More Delicious Sauces For Meats
Love this cowboy steak butter recipe? Try dressing up your steaks with these other tasty sauces!
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📖 Recipe
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Ingredients
Method
- Melt butter over low heat, then add minced garlic and shallots; toast until fragrant. Mix in mustard, lemon juice, lemon zest, cayenne, Calabrian chilies, smoked paprika, smoked salt, and black pepper, then stir to combine. Remove from heat and mix in chopped herbs.
- Drizzle over steak, and enjoy!
Nutrition
Notes
- Toasting the fresh garlic and shallot adds complexity to the flavor, but if you'd like to avoid using the stove altogether, you can simply mix all of the ingredients with softened butter.
- You can enjoy this butter right off the stove like a sauce, or you can let it solidify in the fridge for a more spreadable texture.
- When the butter is melted, it will separate. If you want a more consistent, creamy texture, you can simply mix the ingredients with room-temperature butter and skip the stove entirely.
- For a beautiful presentation, you can pour the liquid butter into a butter mold before refrigerating. You can also roll room-temperature butter into a log using parchment paper.
- Store in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to 1 week. After that, freeze for up to 6 months.
- You can reheat cowboy butter over low heat on the stove or in the microwave in 15-second bursts until it melts.
Hilda Sterner says
We hope you enjoy this recipe!
Kelly Methey says
This sounds fantastic! Now if I just had some and ribeye to put it on right now, I’d be a happy girl!
Hilda Sterner says
Haha, don't we all!