How do you prefer your steak made - flavour wise ?

The goal is not a time, but a temperature. And everyone has their own temps, seasonings, meat, heat sources.

Where are you in the world? What is a steak to you?

I am in California

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Half an hour out of the fridge won’t get any piece of meat to room temp.

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Email me next time you’re doing this. Maybe give me a day or two to get there…

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Lol…I make very few steaks.

Pan seared and finished in the oven with mushrooms and onions
Stovetop with butter and rosemary or
Pan seared filet mignon with goat cheese finished in the oven.

Otherwise my husband seasons it with salt and pepper or some other steak seasoning (Homemade, Montréal or Joe Beef) and Barbecues it.

Really happy that Claus started this thread (as I mentioned upthread) I stand to learn a lot.
I thought the reason was to let it rest for about half an hour as to not shock the meat before cooking it Otherwise, I would always worry about food poisoning leaving it longer than that.

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I hope it’s Ok, that I post a link to an article By Kenji Lopez about myths on how you should treat a steak the correct way.

Link: https://www.seriouseats.com/old-wives-tales-about-cooking-steak

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Butter in the pan with garlic thrown in. Medium high.
Salt and pepper the steak, 4 minutes then flip and 3 minutes. Remove and rest.

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Yes, thank you it is very much appreciated Claus.

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I have thick steaks (2 inch or 5 cm or so) out of the fridge about 4 hours. Thinner stuff an hour or so. For a heavy roast (e.g., 17 pound rib roast), I’ll take it out of the fridge 7 or 8 hours prior. Just means getting up early Christmas morning (which is pretty much the only day I cook an entire 7-bone rib roast).

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Heresy alert!!! I do not place any faith in Kenji, nor Cook Illustrated, nor any absolutist gurus.
Cooking a steak out of the refrigerator, wiped dry or not, has, for me, always resulted in a crusty exterior and/blue center, several degrees rarer than we prefer.
But if he’s happy with his method, that’s what counts.

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Let the discussion begin…
I really enjoy the back and forth as it’s both educational and enlightening.

I guess one question might be, what’s the swing in “regular” refrigerator temps?

The old (27 year old) fridge downstairs where I tend to keep roasts and dry-aged steaks prior to cooking is, at warmest (pushed to least cold), still 34°F. (I also use this fridge for drying whole meat charcuterie like capocollo, basturma and bresaola, and its inability to run at warmer temps is a problem for sure - sometimes I have to interrupt the drying process and let a muscle equilibrate for a couple of weeks, then continue drying).

My upstairs fridge (only 12 years old) tends to run closer to 40°F.

But still, I tend toward letting thick meat set out longer rather than shorter. I’ve never poisoned anyone… yet…

:crazy_face:

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Hasn’t it already?

It has, yet when new information is presented I enjoy reading the back and forth debating.

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To put a bit more information into this, I’m a nerd who charts temperature over time each time that I cook a turkey or a standing rib roast, so I know the starting temps. Looking back on my Excel graphs…

After about 6 hours out of the fridge, when starting to cook, the temperature deep in the breast (turkey) or the middle of the roast (standing rib roast) tends to be right about 50-52°F.

For the two-inch thick bone-in ribeye steaks, after 4 hours out of the fridge it tends to be between 52-54°F.

So it’s not like these guys are warm when I start cooking, but they’re about 20°F above fridge temp.

My 3rd daughter, who is both vegetarian and Serve Safe Certified (she had a culinary concentration in high school and works an Italian bakery on summer/winter breaks), is horrified by how I treat meat.

Just turkeys and rib roasts or do you chart everything you consume?
Yikes :flushed:

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Haha. Yeah, pretty much any large piece of meat, like a whole (bone-in) pork loin or the others mentioned. I’m a nerd (as mentioned).

Mainly I do it so that for large cuts or meat, after about the first hour, I can extend a trendline and figure out (closely enough) when it’s going to be at the finished temp. I use this info to know when I should expect the rolls, mashed taters etc. to be done.

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Disclaimer - I did not say, that I agree with Kenji on all points. Far from.
But his article is interesting none the less.

I would never take a steak out of the fridge and sear it right away. Never ever.

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There is no “standard” answer for this for me. Similar to others who posted, it really depends on the cut of meat, however most of the time I prefer a traditional preparation. Heavy coating of course salt & pepper, finish with clarified butter bathe just before resting. Optional you can add any number of seasonings to this, including an espresso sub I’ve used a few times.

On a rarer occasion(s) I do make steak with sauce, like a recent steak diane I made.

Or I LOVE making a good steak pizziole’ topped with red sauce peppers and onions. However, 90% of the time I’m a traditional salt, pepper and butter to finish.

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Like your daughter (but much, much older…) I’m also horrified at your willingness to risk the health of others by your handling of raw meat, especially that turkey. Chowhound had a famous post about “my kitchen is a magic kitchen” - folks who haven’t made someone ill (yet) by ignoring various safety guidelines.

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#1: Rib eye rubbed with pressed garlic, powdered mustard and coarse ground black pepper. Grilled to medium on the outdoor grill, rest with a blob of Irish butter. #2 Rib eye or flank rubbed with kemon pepper and grilled. Blob of butter again during rest. Sometimes no butter on both. Suits me just fine.

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