Steak done-ness

[LeftEyeMike]

If you want a great deal, Krogers selling your USDA choice whole boneless loin strips for $4.97 a pound, reg they are $9.99 a pound.
Buy one and have steak for a year.

[Buzduk]

I however must disagree with you about your reverse snobbishness to the filet! While I applaud your adherence to steak prep and cooking guidelines the fact that you are not a fan of the filet tells me you have some screws loose! I LOVE FILET and I'm not worried about my weight either ( 6'3" 255) . I also love ribeye, tbone, porterhouse, etc. You have to ask yourself, if filet cost the same as every other cut would you eat more filet ? If not , I stand by my earlier statement about loose screws

All things being equal, a ribeye will be more flavorful than a filet and I'm all about maximizing flavor. I've had filets before and I found them to be bland in comparison to ribeyes. That's not to say that I didn't enjoy eating them. I just felt that I would have enjoyed a ribeye more. So even if they cost the same amount per ounce, I would order a ribeye over a filet.

The closer to beef jerky it is, the happier I am. Love the burnt meat taste.

Dude you just reminded me of something I heard in prison. There was this dumbass crack dealer who celled next to me and he was talking about how he'd pick up women at the club and have unprotected sex with them.
Other inmate: "You don't wrap that s--t up?"
Dumbass: "Nah, man. I like the smell of burnt meat."

The 'burnt meat' comment implied that he wasn't big on foreplay either.

The smell of burnt latex is nasty as well

[Buzduk]

The closer to beef jerky it is, the happier I am. Love the burnt meat taste.

I have a chili rubbed ribeye recipe that is amazing. Little char on the outside and protects the meat inside.

[silencertalk]

Also, they put butter on the steak. I never heard of that. What is the deal with that?

My mother also thought it was odd they put butter and sugar on her sweet potato, but I did not find that all that odd.

[ottosear]

I'm a gas grill man. 11 deg. F was the coldest I ever grilled in.
And it took forever.
I am in total agreement about grilling at home.
But I got fooled in Mexico once.
One of the 10 best steaks I have ever eaten. Arrachera they called it. Cooked over driftwood on a Pacifico beach.
At home...
Delmonico medium rare, if you please.
Or ChateauBriand in a pinch.

[ROFuher]

Also, they put butter on the steak. I never heard of that. What is the deal with that?

Butter helps the salt stick....
I say this in jest knowing it is pure blasphemy in.some. circles.

[LeftEyeMike]

The reason you see butter on a steak, usually garlic butter, is that as it melts, it picks up the flavor of the meat, and makes its own sauce or au jus .

If you want a really good steak at home in the winter, look up how to cook a butter steak. You need a cast iron skillet, butter and medium heat.

[Hush]

I like charcoal broiled steaks, thick, black on the outside, rare on the inside with a nice smoked flavor.

When I was a kid my mother would cook 'em medium to well done, she was afraid of people catching worms or something.

Use to get some nice steak dinners at Jack Dempsey's in NYC.

[Schulze]

If you want a great deal, Krogers selling your USDA choice whole boneless loin strips for $4.97 a pound, reg they are $9.99 a pound.
Buy one and have steak for a year.

I pick out a fat yearling from a rancher, buy it, and haul it to a slaughterhouse where it is hung and cut to my specifications. I have one being processed right now. Last time the cost was a little over $3.00/lb - which includes hamburger of course, so the cost/lb for the good meat about evens out. Now I have steak raised, cured, cut, cooked, and seasoned exactly the way I want for no more than the store bought price, and my prole steak tastes better than the $50/plate crap at the high brow establishments.

If you're going this route, be sure to mention to the rancher during price negotiations that you'll pay him cash and he won't have to drive the thing to market.

[MJF1911]

I guess I'm pretty spoiled having a butcher shop two blocks away from my house and they raise all their animals 20 miles away. So I rarely order steaks in restaurants. That said, I do like the Bison tenderloin at John Bozemans Bistro, Bozeman MT. Gotta order it rare. Its glorious. Its even worth the 600 mile roundtrip drive.

[700PSS]

I fault this thread for making me order a steak last night, when out with family at Texas Roadhouse. http://www.texasroadhouse.com/
Don't go there for a steak, ever. We have visited one location several times and ordered steaks a few of those times, only to receive the steak over-done. Not by just one level, but 2-3 levels over-done. So last night, I figured since we were at a different location, I might be safe to order a steak there. Nope. Ordered a 12 oz. New York strip, medium-rare. What showed up was not one, perfect cut/section of meat, but two sections in one strip-shaped piece, running length-wise down the middle. One section was well-done (brown) and the other was only slightly pink (medium-well).

[Syntax360]

Texas Roadhouse around here does pretty well. You can expect your steak to be overcooked by one level - I order medium-rare to get medium. It's hard to complain at their prices, too. Perhaps you just have a couple of bad ones in your area 700PSS?

[silencertalk]

Everyone - start ordering by temp - I am curious to know how many restaurants can handle that.

[DKDravis]

I make all my burgers out of one part Red deer Venison, one part beef, with medium fat content, and add a few thick slices of dry smoked bacon.
Then I add garlic, parsley and a touch of ground nutmeg... .salt & freshly ground pepper... then through the grinder... once!
Then on the charcoal grill, (This I do by building a log fire outside, that burns down to a lot of nice embers, then I put the grill over it, and the burgers go right on.... and are taken off when medium rare.. any time of year! Great fun in real winter snow....)
My wife bakes the buns, from an old recipe, she says its actually the same kind of flour that the Vikings used (the flour is made from the original type of wheat called "Spelt") ....

NOW I'm hungry ... and its 1 AM here ...

[700PSS]

Due to the really bad experience (again) at Texas Roadwhore Thursday night, we went to "J. Alexander's" tonight. http://www.jalexanders.com/index.php
Have always been extremely pleased there. (We used to like "Stoney River" http://www.stoneyriver.com/ but after they began to have some issues with their supplier that involved the quality of their filets, in addition to "done-ness" inconsistencies, we switched to J. Alexander's.) At J. Alexander's, we always get consistent and perfect results, top-notch service and what is equal to the best filet mignon we have encountered anywhere, including WY, MT, Alberta and British Columbia.

[700PSS]

O.K. Gotta post this one. I have an entry for "The Worst Burger Ever" Award. Yes, even worse than the previously frozen, boiled in water burger at Bennigans (whose 150 corporate locations are now defunct). What qualified this one for "worst"? Well, the wife and I dropped in for lunch during the noon hour yesterday. "Jeffrey's" http://www.jeffreyssportsbars.com/ has a number of locations around Metro ATL and I remember them having really great food and being a nice sports grill, from my experience with them in the past, albeit several years ago.

We both ordered burgers, medium. Now, here you expect a 1/3 -1/2 lb. or so steakhouse quality burger, grilled to order. It seemed to take a really long time for our food to arrive, even though they weren't busy at all. Well, I can only imagine that the "cook" (not chef) must have thrown a couple of frozen patties on the over-heated grill and walked off for a 15-minute smoke break. What we got was two char-grilled (and I emphasize "char") crisp discs of mammal flesh that not only showed no pink inside, but had not one drop of juice left in them. Neither could be cut with a fork. Both were hard to cut with a regular knife and were hard to even chew. We're talking "no redeeming value as a consumable food item" here. The only thing you could taste was that burnt, charred taste that you can't get rid of easily. When the server came by and saw the result, she informed the manager, who comped our entire check. Nevertheless, I give this location the most coveted award of all, "Landmark Value Only", as it will be a cold day in hell before you find me there again.

[ottosear]

A Texas Roadhouse here in West Bend Wis. was closed because the "cook" got pissed that an order was sent back.
He got even by placing his pubes on the diners steak.
He is now in jail.

[este]

Here is what I found. You corporate steakhouses don't want a raw foods lawsuit, so Rare is either not an option, or more likely they scale the range up one. So at Outback if you order Rare and they agree to server that (not sure Outback does) it comes Medium-Rare. You go to a good local steakhouse and order Rare, you're more likely to get Rare.

Depending on what type of place you go to, your idea of Rare might be skewed.

I've also observed fancy people like their meat more rare. At a big fancy corporate dinner I was at a guy got endlessly mocked for ordering his meat well-done while everyone else was ordering "as rare as the chef will allow". I like medium-rare myself.

[kernelkrink]

I like all my beef with a thick black/brown crust on the outside, with a well done interior, all brown and no pink. What would that be, Black and Well Done?

Back in the day, Mom bought something called a "Whiz Grid", similar to a George Foreman grill, but the plates were perfectly flat and came together with no gap. Essentially a miniature pants presser like ya see at the dry cleaners. Best way to cook beef I have ever tasted, as long as it was boneless. Bacon too, perfectly flat and evenly done. That thing made the best burgers, you could put a golf ball sized piece of hamburger in the middle, compress the two halves as tight as you could, and a little lace doilie looking disc of a burger would come out. You could actually see through it! Stack two-three on a bun with Swiss and ketchup, pile on the bacon.....man I wish I could find one of those things now!

[JohnnyC]

I like all my beef with a thick black/brown crust on the outside, with a well done interior, all brown and no pink. What would that be, Black and Well Done?

What would that be? Sacrilege.

[MJF1911]

I like all my beef with a thick black/brown crust on the outside, with a well done interior, all brown and no pink. What would that be, Black and Well Done?

What would that be? Sacrilege.

You might as well eat tire treads.

[Russian]

xx

[Schulze]

Also, they put butter on the steak. I never heard of that. What is the deal with that?

People don't like to see fat on their steak so they cook lean meat then add butter for flavor.

[este]

Also, they put butter on the steak. I never heard of that. What is the deal with that?

People don't like to see fat on their steak so they cook lean meat then add butter for flavor.

I'll drop a plop of butter down before searing, but I've never seen it served with/on top. That seems like an American invention right there.

Like cheese whiz on an otherwise good steak sandwich... F--k YOU PHILLY, that's not legit!

[ottosear]

Also, they put butter on the steak. I never heard of that. What is the deal with that?

People don't like to see fat on their steak so they cook lean meat then add butter for flavor.

I'll drop a plop of butter down before searing, but I've never seen it served with/on top. That seems like an American invention right there.

Like cheese whiz on an otherwise good steak sandwich... F--k YOU PHILLY, that's not legit!

Speaking for my Brothers and Sisters from Wisconsin...
Liquid cheese is NOT cheese !!