Parrilla & Charcoal
The buying checklist starts at a US counter, not at a Spanish menu. You need a translation you can say out loud: vacío, entraña, tira, and bife de chorizo, plus a sense of what each piece costs you in salt, grate height, and doneness. A home asado fails more often in the shopping cart, when two of those names get replaced by the wrong steak, than it does on a well-built fire.
This page is a cut glossary with cook notes for a home parrilla. It is not a Santa Maria tri-tip tutorial, and it is not an asado-flow or chimichurri recipe. Those subjects stay on their own pages when you need them. The case comparison that matters here is the Argentine name versus the US label in the display case.
A US butcher translation for vacío, entraña, tira and bife de chorizo
At a US butcher, vacio is often sold as flank, or as vacio at a Latin counter. Entrana is skirt, tira is cross-cut short ribs, and bife de chorizo is a New York strip, not a sausage. Ask for the cut, then check the grain and the bones.
Vacío in Argentina is a larger, looser-grained flap from the flank and plate area. A tight, thin US flank steak can be a fair stand-in, but it is not always the same piece. If a Latin butcher has vacío in the case, buy that and you will see more width and a slightly thicker, fattier sheet than a skinny flank.
Entraña is skirt steak, ideally the outside skirt when you can get it, with the heavy membrane trimmed. Tira, or asado de tira, is beef short rib cut across the bone into strips, the flanken style, not a long English-cut rib and not a pork spare rib. Bife de chorizo is the strip loin. The word chorizo here is about the shape of the muscle, not the spiced sausage. For a catalog of common US steak names, the Certified Angus Beef cuts catalog is a useful English-language map; it will not list Argentine names, which is why the translation step still happens at the counter.
Ojo de bife, if it comes up, is ribeye. It is a popular steak, and it is not one of the four title cuts. Tri-tip is a California-style Santa Maria centerpiece, not an Argentine asado staple. Use how to cook Santa Maria tri-tip when that is the roast you actually bought.
What each cut wants: salt, height and a doneness window
Salt is coarse and early enough to take, not a thick rub and not a sweet marinade. These cuts want a dry surface and room on the grate. Height is the parrilla’s real control: start farther from the coals if the piece is fatty or thick, then lower as fat renders or as you want more color. This guide will not invent inch measurements for every fire. Watch the meat, not a memorized gap.
Doneness windows differ. Entraña is thin and cooks fast; it can overshoot while you turn a thicker strip. Vacío has a loose grain and often sits a little longer than a rare steak so the fat and fibers relax, without becoming a pot roast. Tira needs time for the fat to render around the bones. Bife de chorizo behaves like a familiar strip steak, with a true center you can probe.
The FDA safe food-handling chart lists 145°F, with a three-minute rest, for beef steaks. That official minimum is the line this page cites. Traditional asado preferences sometimes run redder or more done than a single number; if you leave the official minimum, do it knowingly. Use the FDA safe food-handling chart and the FDA kitchen food-safety page when you go from raw cuts to the board.
| Argentine name | Common US label | Salt, height, doneness cue |
|---|---|---|
| Vacío | Often flank, or vacío at a Latin counter | Coarse salt; start a little higher, then lower as fat laces render; slice across the grain |
| Entraña | Skirt steak, preferably outside skirt | Salt, dry surface, a shorter window; do not leave it over a hard fire while you tend other cuts |
| Tira (asado de tira) | Flanken or cross-cut beef short ribs | Salt; start higher to render, then closer for color; cook until the fat has softened, not until the bone falls out |
| Bife de chorizo | New York strip or sirloin strip | Salt; a familiar steak height path; probe the center and rest |
A simple shopping list for a four-person asado
A four-person asado is easier when you buy fewer, clearer pieces rather than one of everything in the case. A practical sketch, not a tested banquet, is one bife de chorizo or two smaller strip steaks, one vacío or a comparable flank, one pack of entraña, and a small tray of tira if the butcher has it and your grate can take the extra course. That mix gives you a familiar steak, a sliced flap, a quick skirt, and a bony rib plate without crowding.
Think in pieces you can see on the grate, not in a single pound target this article cannot justify as a lab result. If the vacio is huge, buy one and skip a second large steak. If the tira tray is heavy, you may not need as much strip.
Skirt and short rib can be priced like special-occasion meat in some US shops, while a strip is easier to find. Buy what you can identify and afford, rather than forcing a four-cut menu that stretches the grate.
| Course | A four-person sketch | If the case does not have it |
|---|---|---|
| Familiar steak | One bife de chorizo, or two modest strip steaks | A sirloin steak can stand in; ribeye is ojo de bife, a different buy |
| Sliced flap | One vacío, or a flank of similar size | Sirloin flap or bavette is closer in grain than a tight eye of round |
| Quick, thin steak | One pack of entraña, membrane trimmed | US skirt; hanger is a last-resort cousin, not the same muscle |
| Bony rib course | A small tray of tira, flanken cut | Cross-cut beef short ribs; not English-cut bones, and not pork ribs |
Substitutions when the exact cut is not in the case
Substitution is a grain-and-bone problem, not a “any steak will do” problem. If there is no vacío, a flank or a sirloin flap is a closer cousin than a lean round roast. If there is no entraña, ask for skirt and inspect the membrane. If there is no tira, ask whether the shop can cut short ribs across the bone; a thick English-cut rib is a different cook. If there is no bife de chorizo by that name, a New York strip is the translation, not a filet and not a chuck roast.
Do not replace tira with baby-back pork ribs and call it asado de tira. Those pork methods are a different meat and clock. Do not replace entrana with flank just because both are thin; they have different grains and windows.
If the only large roast in the case is a tri-tip, cook it as tri-tip, and do not pretend it is vacio.
How this sits beside asado flow, chimichurri and US skirt or flank pages
An asado is also a sequence: fire first, then slower cuts, then faster steaks, then a rest and a slice. This guide will not write that full hosting timeline or a chimichurri formula. Salt the meat, give each cut the height it wants, and do not bury the steaks in a heavy sauce before they see the grate.
US skirt and flank methods that already live on the site, including high-heat or fajita-style pages, are useful when that is the cooker and the marinade you actually have. On a home parrilla, keep the surface drier and the seasoning simpler, then slice across the grain the same way those methods already teach.
For cooker choice, use Argentine parrilla versus Santa Maria grill. For a broader live-fire menu, see what to cook on a Santa Maria grill. A unit such as the Argentine Santa Maria style parrilla grill is one home example of the adjustable-grate idea this shopping list assumes.
A grate-space plan for mixed cuts
Mixed cuts fail when everything sits in the hottest corridor at once. Give tira a zone where fat can render without drowning the strip steak in flare. Give entraña a place you can reach quickly. Give vacío enough width to lie flat. Leave a calmer edge so a finished piece has somewhere to sit without going into a cold oven as your only plan.
If the grate is small, drop a course. A well-cooked strip and a vacío will feed four more calmly than four crowded names. Portable live-fire cookers make this limit obvious; see portable Santa Maria grilling away from home and portable Santa Maria grills at camp and the tailgate when the grate is even smaller than a backyard parrilla.
Build the fire so you have a hotter bed and a milder bed, then use grate height as the second control. For grease, flare, and standing around an open fire, stay with NFPA grilling safety and U.S. Fire Administration cooking-fire prevention, plus Ready.gov home-fire guidance.
A trim and silver-skin note so the grate does not become a flare pit
Trim the loose, papery silver skin and the ragged, hanging fat that will melt straight into the fire, especially on entraña, vacío, and tira. You are not trying to make the meat lean. You are trying to keep the grate from turning into a flare pit that blackens the next steak in line. Leave the seams of fat that will baste the muscle as they render.
On skirt, a thick membrane on the outside should come off before salt, or it will shrink and chew like plastic. On tira, stand the pieces so you can see the bones and so fat has a path, rather than stacking a pile of ribs over the hottest coals at the first minute.
After the cook, rest the steaks, then slice vacío and entraña across the grain. Serve tira in its strips, and slice the bife de chorizo like a strip steak. Use a clean board for the finished meat. Leftovers belong on the timeline in the FDA advice on storing food safely.
A recap of who this method is for, and who should use a different cooker
This method is for a home cook who can get to a butcher, or a well-labeled grocery case, and who has a parrilla or another adjustable-grate live-fire grill. It is a shopping and height-planning guide, not a reason to force these cuts onto a tiny infrared sear box or a covered gas grill with no firebed.
If your only cooker is a conventional gas grill, you can still buy these cuts and cook them with a hot grate and a finish zone, but you will not have the same height control. If the roast in the cart is a tri-tip, use the tri-tip page. Buy the four translations you can actually find, salt them, and give them room on the grate.
If you are shopping for the cooker as well as the cuts, look at an adjustable-grate unit such as the Argentine Santa Maria style parrilla grill, then buy only as many of these four cuts as that grate can hold calmly.
FAQ
What are the top 3 best cuts of steak?
This page will not rank a universal top three. For a home asado on a parrilla, the cuts that usually earn a place on the grate are bife de chorizo (a New York strip or sirloin strip in US terms), vacío (often sold as flank, or as vacío at a Latin counter), and entraña (skirt). Tira, the cross-cut short rib, is the classic bony course beside those steaks, not a fourth steak in the same sense. Choose by what your butcher actually has, and by how much grate space you can give each piece, rather than by a trophy list.
What is "ojo de bife" in English?
Ojo de bife is the ribeye: the eye of the rib primal, sold in US shops as ribeye or rib-eye steak. It is not bife de chorizo, which is the strip loin, and it is not entraña, which is skirt. If you want a well-marbled, thicker steak course on a home parrilla, ojo de bife is the usual translation. This guide still centers the four cuts in the title, and treats ojo de bife as the answer to this naming question rather than as a fifth required buy.
Does any Costco beef come from Argentina?
Sourcing changes by season, by warehouse, and by the specific pack, and this page will not invent a current Costco answer. Read the label on the tray in your hands, and treat “Argentine-style cuts” as a butchery translation, not as a promise that the animal was raised in Argentina. You can cook vacío, entraña, tira, and bife de chorizo from US or imported beef if the cut itself is right. Country of origin is a packing fact, not a substitute for trim, thickness, and a sensible grate plan.
Is Argentina beef higher quality than American beef?
No national ranking belongs on this page. Argentine and US beef are produced under different feeding traditions, grading systems, and cattle types, and quality still lives in the specific animal, the aging, the trim, and the cook. Grass-fed or grain-finished meat can be excellent or ordinary in either place. For a home asado, buy the cuts you can identify, salt them simply, and cook them to a doneness you can defend, including the FDA chart’s official minimum for steaks, rather than arguing about flags on the label.
More to Read
How to Start and Safely Extinguish a Wood Fire Pit
How to start a fire pit with dry wood and no lighter fluid, then extinguish it with water, sand, or a snuffer until the coals are truly cold.
Two-Zone Grilling on a Gas Grill: A Setup You Can Repeat Every Week
Set up two-zone grilling on a gas grill with burner patterns for 3-, 4-, and 6-burner grills, a lid rule, and a weekly routine you can repeat.
Heat Windows After the Last Pie: Mains and Bread in a Gas or Pellet Oven
What to cook in a gas or pellet pizza oven after pizza: use falling-heat windows for mains, bread, and pastry, plus a clear temperature-band map.
