How Do You Like Your Steak?

Of the pictured, I'd say medium, but it really depends on the fat content and the grill setup.

5 is for people that don't actually like steak.

I like beef jerky if its prepared properly (not from a large corporation) but I've never cared for steak too much

From the picture I'd be torn between 1 and 2, but in general, medium rare is the only way to go.

I think that this is an insult for all the brave cavemen that died or suffered horrible injuries in their noble endeavor to tame fire. Eating steaks rare is dishonorable to them, and to the evolutionary shifts of our jawbone and digestive tracts over the last 100,000 years. We haven't come this far as a tool-making species to go back and eat like Cro-magnon.

While we still have K9 teeth...we shall eat meat nearly raw!

None of those steaks in the OP look particularly good, its decent meat but they're all too dry for the level of doneness.

Its like somebody threw them in a crappy pan that doesn't transfer heat well, so that they didn't sear properly and then the juices ran out.

Now this is my idea of what a medium steak should look like.

Medium to medium rare

Anything from blue to rare, but steak is steak and as long as the meat is good.

I don't eat steak in Belgium as a rule as the meat here is tasteless, I do love a good Aberdeen Angus steak when I'm back home in Scotland tho.

I used to eat steak well done and with A1 sauce. Boy, how wrong I was!

Now we have the steaks between medium and medium rare, just salt and pepper, no need for salt! Experimenting with cooking pans though; the wife got me a grilled cast iron pan but it seems like the usual teflon pan cooks the steak better. I need to order a flat cast iron pan to try out.

if y'all are not using a Thermometer to gauge doneness, let me say you are doing it wrong.

Amateur

Here in the South I order rare, which means one gets a medium rare steak, which is fine.

If you are cooking a steak in skillet, you are doing it wrong, as well.

The only kind of steak that should be cooked in a pan is "chicken fried." Other than that, you people have serious issues. cichlidfan is correct.

The only way to eat a steak is rare. On this there can be no debate.

When they ask if you want "steak sauce" or other assorted toppings (grilled onions, sauces, whatever) your answer should always be "I hope not."

If your "steak" needs bacon wrapped around it because it's a lousy piece of meat masquerading as a fine cut (you know which one) then you should just save your money and eat a hockey puck.

I am always open to being educated
And I'm not shy of buying "expensive" kitchen implements if I know it will be well-used!



Like I said earlier, salt and pepper on the steak, a touch of oil on the pan, and then some butter and some garlic in the pan with the steak as it cooks. No sauce or anything when eating, the steak is divine as it is! Mixed vegetables and some creamy mash to go with it.

Usually go to the local slaughterhouse for some nice New York strip.

What cuts do you guys use and how do you cook it?

Outdoor grill (over charcoal/wood), indoor electric grill (Farberware used to sell a great one), and the last option being a George Foreman Grill. Any of these are far superior to a skillet.

I have found that a good steak seared on both sides in a very hot cast iron pan and then finished in the oven is just as good as and in some cases better than a steak cook on a grill.

well done

I got a George Foreman.... but why is it superior to a skillet? Quicker cooking time??


I never understood why you'd cook in in the oven when you can have it on the cast iron for a few more minutes and be done. For some reason, I think those who cook via sous vide is cheating

Some of the best steaks I've ever made, which were as good as anything I've ever eaten at a high priced steakhouse, were done in a cast iron pan.

The trick is to have a massive slab of cast iron as a hotplate, like the .80 inch thick beasts we had in the train kitchen cars at my last job. A regular stovetop burner is a joke.

In conjunction with the iron pan these would transfer heat and bring out flavor unlike anything you've probably ever used before, and it happens in a hurry,

As for cuts I like to use grassfed ribeye or occasionally Kobe style steaks, although the latter are very tricky to cook properly. Everything must be done perfectly or else you end up with tastes like a pile of fatty roast beef.

Never tasted the difference between high broiled and pan seared imo though it's probably some recipes require pan seared for some spices.

To an extent, yes. The key, IMHO, is to sear the meat, sealing in the flavor and juices, quickly and at the same time bringing the interior to temperature before it can dry out. The GF grill does a very good job of doing that. Since you have one, give it a shot.

I am a big pork chop fan, and I think they are harder to cook correctly than a steak. The doneness window is smaller which makes hitting the target more difficult. The GF grill is awesome for (boneless) chops.

Butter really helps the searing process and general flavor along if you use a pan, although not too much and it should be unsalted grass fed stuff.

I thought more like since you're squeezing the meat between two hot plates?

I'm not sure about sealing in the flavor and juices, my skillet-cooked or cast iron-cooked steaks are quite flavorful and juicy. So much so that I've started cutting the steaks on a plate until I can get a proper chopping board with deep-enough grooves to contain the juices. Any tips on how exactly to do this on a George Foreman? How do I add in the butter as it'll just run off the GF?

The only thing I'm not good at is multi-tasking. If I'm cooking the mash or the vegetables alongside the steak, I'll get one dish wrong. So I've started cooking the mash and vegetables beforehand, then I concentrate on the steak. My only issue is then the mash and vegetables get cold. Maybe store them in a pre-heated oven just to keep warm?



Thinner, so very quick to cook. I've stopped eating pork chops back home because it was like eating leather. Might need to try again here.

Searing a steak is important, it does create flavor, but it doesn't "seal in juices".

http://steakperfection.blogspot.com/2011/05/steak-myth-1-searing-seals-in-juices.html

The trick is to bring it up to temp slowly, then sear it to crust the outside and give it color.
To nail it every time without guessing, use a thermometer.

I have taught my neighbors how to do this, and they now swear by the thermometer method.
That, and they will never order a pork chop when we go out, because now we can crush anything that is served by the restaurants.

If you do it the way where you sear it first, you dry out the outside before the inside ever gets cooked properly.

Pan seared is better because the whole steak comes into contact with the hot surface.
Unless you are doing it right over a hot bed of coals, this is preferred.
Why settle for "grill lines" when you can get the Millaird process on the WHOLE cut of meat?

When on the gas grill, I finish my steaks on the griddle side (roughly 450F) to get that sear
On the charcoal, it is directly over the coals (550F +)

Last Wednesday's pork dinner

I'll h

I'll have give that a try, but I still say that nothing cooks meat like a mass of iron does.

Thank you.

Sorry kids, but IMHO there is nothing in the world that can compare to the taste and enjoyment I get from a good cut of meat GRILLED!

A few hickory chips, basil/orange/grapefruit wood and the night and day difference between hacking and presenting a great steak

Get creative folks...seriously.

Those fancy expensive steak houses you go to put their steak in the oven and then finish it in the 1100F degree range to give it that fancy crust!

Who eats out

I am a WAY better cook than some millennial drama boy/girl....last time I went to Outback (somebody else paid) it was a joke....

YOU JUST ASSUMED THEIR GENDER !1!! !!

Seriously, steaks are one thing, but there are a lot of other foods that are inconventient to prepare at home and thus its worth eating out.

Nixer, I am not arguing that you don't slay a steak on a grill.
But there are steak houses in Dallas that will crush a steak. Mind you, they are north of $60 for the STEAK by itself, but they are unlike anything I have had off someone's grill.

Personally, I want a steak done by ME over one that I would buy at a restaurant.

My Sister lives in Plano...

I've heard how good a steak place u can find there.

One of these days...

I don't even boil water so if I want a steak I have to go out to a restaurant. As a general rule I like my steaks medium or medium rare. It depends on what the cut of meat is.

So the wife isn't able to cook either?


Wheels

I had actually forgotten but I tried such a technique the last time I cooked a steak at home, the reverse of what I wrote earlier: instead of sear then finish in the oven I started in the oven at a relatively low temp (~200 I believe) until internal temp hit about 130-135, then remove it from the oven and sear it in a cast iron pan pre-heated to "as hot as I could get it" on the stove top.

Worked very well.

For steaks, there is no guessing if you're experienced. I used to cook steaks at a steak house on a large griddle that I brushed butter on and learned (and still use) the touch method to determine how well a steak is cooked. BTW, a hot griddle or fire if you're grilling for searing is great for Rare, MR and M steaks. MW to Well should go to a cooler side of however you're cooking it for a slower cooking process...which is not recommended by me because MW to W is just blasphemy...lol.

Here's a little tutorial on the touch method.

NoNo No and thrice Noooo, never a George Foreman grill, it's the spawn of the devil and designed to extract all the juices from your meat, my brother had one and after he died I threw it in the trash, it was only a few months old too.

my normal cooking instrument for steak is a gas grill, but it all depends on what I'm trying to achieve.

I have different frying pans with different heating properties, some are slow transfer of heat and some are fast, cooking a piece of salmon the fast transfer pan is great if I use it dry, crisping the skin first and cooking it about 3/4 the way through lowering the heat and cooking it on the other side until it has a hint of rareness left in it Mmmmmm

Went to a grill workshop last summer.

As others have said, the trick is to run a slow temp for actually doing the meat, and then a very high temp for searing the outside which creates the taste. The gas grill I was shown had a slow, topped section, and an extra-hot ceramic plate for the crust.

Also mentioned at that workshop: Charcoal is barely hot enough. And electric would be right out.

She's a pharmacist at a hospital. That kind of work schedule is not conducive to cooking. Especially steaks.

My niece is also a pharmacist at a research hospital, she was here on Saturday and it was lamb that I served up for us But yes, she does not have a lot of time either and what time she does have she dedicates to Doctors Without Borders (Medicine sans Frontiers)

Where she works: virga Jessa Ziekenhuis

Mine should eventually be able to heal, and walk away.

-Skater

Go Skater!

2 with the crust of 5.

Cast iron got me there.

THIS is Gospel.

Yep, NW Alabama.

Wife refers to it as "cooked," and one of the many things we both had to adjust to.

Cooking a well done steak is actually difficult to do correctly; it's easy to over cook it and have the meat come out dry and leathery. The secret is to pull it off the heat and let it continue to cook the rest of the way through on a plate.

I'm seriously jonesing for a nice chateau briand right now from either Shula's or Ruth Chris.

Yep, that is also true of any level of doneness you want. If you leave it on the heat until you get to a "2" it maybe be closer to "3" by the time you sink a fork in it.

Oven cooking and then searing is just a shortcut that restaurants use so that the chef/cook doesn't have to focus on your steak, but can multitask doing other things as well. It is not the ideal way to cook a steak. The real secret is turning the steak over often before the juices start to come out on the top side, thus keeping the hot juices inside. My technique is to caramelize first, reduce temperature, and turn over often. Juicy steak every time ;-) Of course, nothing beats a charcoal grilled steak, but I don't mind using a cast iron skillet indoors. Just my 2 cents...

The problem if you do it all on the same temp is that the amount of heat needed to get a proper crust will seep into the meat and turn the edges into well done even if you want raw in the middle.

The hotter you sear, for the shortest amount of time, the more volume you preserve as raw.

So yes, if you reduce temp you get a similar bonus than doing it on the oven and on the hot skillet.

Why do I feel like I'm watching an episode of "Iron Chef"?

Because PM, this is serious stuff!!!

With a Reverse Sear, you don't lose any juice, as the temp comes up too slow to force it out.
But the real joy is the Maillard Reaction when the outside temp of the meat exceeds 300F and the meat browns, and all the yummy chemical reactions happen to the sugars and amino acids.
To best get this, it needs to be over a serious flame, or laying flat on a hot griddle. "Grill lines" are not enough. Why settle for a line when you can do the whole thing.

Someone previous mentioned that charcoal doesn't get hot enough. I can easily get my Kingsford Professional charcoal in the Weber north of 700F at the grate. Which is silly. Ha.

Cast Iron, medium rare. I know about the sou vide method, reverse sear with the oven etc. I’ll just stick to keeping it simple. I also prefer my skillet to the grill. Grill lines are more cosmetic than anything to me, I like a full even sear.

This arrived in my inbox this morning:

HOW TO MAKE THE PERFECT STEAK

F4U, I did that for Wifey on Valentines Day. Basically made "Prime Rib" out of the Ribeye steak using that method.
It was very good, and we enjoyed it. HOWEVER it is not the same in flavor had it been on the Charcoal grill. And even the gas grill gives it a different taste that I prefer.
But for a kitchen cooked steak it is a great recipe!

BIll should be the official spokesperson for the US Beef Council.

I loooooooooooove red meat, but I've had to cut back since my colon cancer ordeal. And charring meat of any kind is also a suspected culprit in causing colon cancer so that's a double whammy on a good seared steak. But I still enjoy one every 3-4 weeks.

I guess it's time to buy a backyard oven... been doing it wrong all these years

Anything more than 3 is criminal

try putting your steak in a ziploc, then in a rice cooker on temperature hold mode for 30-60mins then sear it at high heat in a frying pan.

beautiful rare steak every time. super juicy.

I sous vide steaks too. Perfect 160 all through in a vacuum seal bag. Then cast iron. Most perfectly even cooked steaks amd juiciest.