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Home » Grilled Steak » Turmeric Spiced Steak and South African Wine

Turmeric Spiced Steak and South African Wine

Published: Aug 13, 2016 · Modified: Apr 6, 2025 by Cooking Chat · This post may contain affiliate links

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Turmeric Spiced Steak is a flavorful recipe for juicy grilled steak. We served it with a Pinotage red wine from South Africa. We also enjoyed that Pinotage with some South African cured beef called biltong. Read along for the food and wine pairing details, or or click here to jump down to the recipe.
turmeric spiced on a plate with greens and red wine.

I haven’t gravitated toward South African wines very often, so I was ready to do some experimenting when Sarah suggested focusing on the region for this month’s Wine Pairing Weekend event.

White wine made from Chenin Blanc is what I have had the most from South Africa, and have enjoyed a number of bottles over the years. Pinotage is what has deterred me from trying more South African wine. The first few times I tried this distinctive red wine from South Africa I was turned off by a meaty characteristic that I said tasted like zebra. Given that I haven’t eaten zebra, this tasting note was clearly influenced by knowledge of the wine’s origins.

Being open minded, I have tried Pinotage a few times recently at Pairings Wine & Food, and started warming up to it a bit. I decided to focus on pairings with Pinotage for our #winePW exploration of South African wines. We started out by pairing biltong with Pinotage, followed by serving the wine with our Turmeric Spiced Steak recipe.

Biltong and Pinotage Pairing

Biltong cured beef paired with Pinotage.

I had never heard of biltong until I met one of the founders of Kalahari Biltong offering samples at Pairings. When this South African meat snack was described as a cross between beef jerky and prosciutto, I was up for trying it based on the mention of the latter. I really liked the flavors, enhanced by a bold red wine pairing. I enjoyed hearing about how the co-founders discovered biltong during a trip to South Africa to compete in an Ironman and Ultra Marathon. I also appreciated the simplicity of the snack, just good beef along with five other natural ingredients.

As you might suspect, the meat and spices of the biltong paired very well with the 2014 Rooiberg Winery Pinotage. More details on the wine follow below.

Turmeric Spiced Steak

Grilled Turmeric Spiced Steak

I have a go to spice rub for steak made with garlic powder and cumin, but you’ve got to mix it up sometimes! When I started thinking about pairings to go with Pinotage, I recalled some South African foods feature various curries. This got me thinking about Indian food, and my intention to come up with some new recipes featuring turmeric.

You might already know turmeric is a popular ingredient these days, but may well also be saying, “What is turmeric?”. Turmeric is a bright yellow powder obtained from turmeric plants, which is in the ginger family. Turmeric has long been thought to have anti-inflammatory qualities, and now has been suggested as being helpful for a number of different health reasons, summarized in this article. If you’re ready to go order some ground turmeric, here’s my Amazon affiliate link.

I think of turmeric in curries and other Indian dishes, and primarily either for chicken or vegetarian recipes. But I suspected it would add some good flavor to our grilled ribeye steak, and combined it with coriander, garlic and salt. If you want to try to get some turmeric into your diet, our Turmeric Spiced Steak recipe is a good place to start! Of course, ribeye has plenty of flavor on it’s own, but the turmeric does add some notable yet nuanced peppery spice to the meat.

You could certainly use this rub with other cuts of steak such as NY strip steak or sirloin. I suspect it would be good on a pork chop, too!

Pinotage Wine Pairing for Turmeric Spiced Steak

As mentioned earlier, I opened a bottle of 2014 Rooiberg Winery Pinotage ($12, 14% ABV) for to pair with our Turmeric Spiced Steak. I got underbrush and sage on the nose. Plum fruit and cinnamon notes, also some leather. A meaty wine, with a nice smooth finish. This Pinotage definitely has the heft to stand up to the steak, and the leather and cinnamon spice played along nicely with the turmeric spice. Definitely a good pairing for the turmeric spiced steak recipe, and also very good with the biltong. This wine is a great value at around $12/bottle, and I will be getting it again.

Rooiberg Pinotage is a very good wine value, and pairs well with Turmeric Spiced Steak.

Rooiberg Winery is located near Rooiberg Mountain, in the Robertson Wine Valley. I know very little about South Africa’s wine regions, but can tell you that the Robertson Wine Valley is in the Southwestern part of South Africa.

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Recipe card

Turmeric Spiced Steak

Grilled Turmeric Spiced Steak
Print Recipe

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5 from 2 reviews

Turmeric spice rub flavors juicy grilled ribeye steak.

  • Author: Cooking Chat
  • Prep Time: 5 mins
  • Cook Time: 14 mins
  • Total Time: 19 mins
  • Yield: 4 servings 1x
  • Category: Main
  • Method: grilling
  • Cuisine: Grilling

Ingredients

Scale
  • ½ tsp turmeric
  • ¾ tsp coriander
  • 1 tsp garlic
  • 1 tsp salt
  • 2 ribeye steaks, about 28 ozs total (or other cuts such as NY strip steak or sirloin)

Instructions

  1. Combine turmeric, coriander, garlic and salt in a bowl.
  2. Sprinkle some of the rub over the steaks, and rub into the meat. Turn over, and repeat. Let the steaks sit at room temperature with the rub for about 15 minutes.
  3. Preheat a grill to medium high. Spray the grill with oil spray. Place the steaks on the grill, and cook with the grill covered for 7 minutes. Turn the steaks over, and cook for another 7 minutes.
  4. Check the steaks for doneness after 14 minutes total grilling time, which is roughly how long it should take to get the steaks done medium rare. Adjust grilling times based on steak thickness and your preferences.
  5. Slice the steak, serve and enjoy!

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Turmeric Spiced Steak

South African Wine Pairings

Here is a look at the wines and pairings the Wine Pairing Weekend group explored this month!

  • Camilla from Culinary Adventures with Camilla: Bunny Chow & A Pinotage
  • Sarah and Tim from Curious Cuisiniere: Frikkadel with Sheba Sauce and a South African Cabernet Sauvignon
  • Jennifer from Vino Travels: South African Chenin Blanc with Shrimp Scampi
  • Michelle from Rockin Red Blog: #WinePW Explores South African #Wine ~ A Whale’s Tale
  • Nancy from Pull That Cork: Waterkloof Cape Coral Rosé and BLT
  • David from Cooking Chat: Turmeric Spiced Steak and South African Wine Pairings (you are here!)
  • Christy from Confessions of a Culinary Diva: Tasting South African Food & Wine
  • Gwendolyn from Wine Predator: Food with spice and wine that’s nice!

Coming Up for #WinePW

Our September #winePW theme will be “Grüner Veltliner Pairings,” on September 10th, 2016. The event will be hosted by Martin at ENOFYLZ Wine Blog, so keep an eye out for details!

For a list of past and upcoming #winePW event, visit the Wine Pairing Weekend calendar. We’d love to have you online with us!

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Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Sarah | Curious Cuisiniere

    August 13, 2016 at 8:05 am

    This sounds like a wonderful South African inspired meal and a perfect pairing! We fell in love with biltong when we were over there. It’s like jerky, but so much better!

    Reply
    • Cooking Chat

      August 13, 2016 at 9:20 am

      I can see why you came to like biltong! It was a great pairing, thanks Sarah.

      Reply
  2. Nancy|PullThatCork

    August 13, 2016 at 10:14 am

    Great info and your pairing looks delicious, as always!

    Reply
    • Cooking Chat

      August 13, 2016 at 12:56 pm

      Thanks Nancy!

      Reply
  3. Jennifer Martin (Vino Travels)

    August 13, 2016 at 7:08 pm

    The very first South African wine I had was a pinotage as well and it tasted like burnt rubber tires. I stayed away from the wines for a long time until I went there and it totally changed my perspective on wines from there. Lesson learned….always give it ago with other producers before making a final judgement.

    Reply
  4. Michelle

    August 15, 2016 at 12:35 pm

    love the variety of South Aftican wines shared. Your pinotage & tumeric steak sound delicious.

    Reply
  5. Christy @ Confessions of a Culinary Diva

    August 15, 2016 at 11:31 pm

    What a great pairing, I can imagine how flavorful that spice mixture was with the steak and I’ve heard about the Bilitong – its on my to experiment with list. The wine sounds like a great pairing!

    Reply
    • Cooking Chat

      August 16, 2016 at 5:07 am

      Definitely worth trying some biltong!

      Reply

Trackbacks

  1. Frikkadel with Sheba Sauce • Curious Cuisiniere says:
    August 14, 2016 at 10:00 am

    […] David from Cooking Chat: Turmeric Spiced Steak and South African Wine Pairings […]

    Reply
  2. Waterkloof Cape Coral Rosé and BLT for #winePW | Pull That Cork says:
    August 17, 2016 at 10:10 am

    […] David from Cooking Chat: Turmeric Spiced Steak and South African Wine Pairings […]

    Reply

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Hi there! I'm David. I love creating tasty, (mostly) healthy recipes, finding great wine pairings, and sharing good food with family and friends. learn more about me!

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