It's somebody's birthday?

Oh, and Boards, that steak looked scrumptious!!

I ate a virtual meal just looking at your photo (have not had breakfast yet....).

ZVUGKTUBM wrote:I don't eat much beef any more, but I love it rare. I prefer my steaks to be medium-rare, but for roast beef or prime rib I want the meat to howl "Moooo!".

Years ago, on one of my overseas tours to Okinawa, I went to the Sunday brunch over at the Kadena Air Base Officers' Club. They had this massive steamship round hanging from a meat-hook, and you could get your beef sliced to order. I told the chef to cut me the reddest piece he could find, and later went back for seconds.

After my heart attack in 2914, my beef-consumption dropped off considerably. The wife keeps a close watch on me, though she did allow me to have an early dinner at Wendy's yesterday. I ate a bacon cheeseburger and fries, washed down with an ice-cold coke, and it was delicious.

When Hubby and I go to dinner for steak with friends they ask if we ordering Prime Rib... if so they request the darkest area in the restaurant. Not quite mooing but close.

Happy belated birthday boards.

Congratulations! I hope you and your family had a grand day.

I too love cooking and, if I say so myself, am fairly accomplished.

Love my steaks VERY RARE. When I can, I cook mine right on the coals. A combination of charcoal, not the briquettes and chunks of hardwood.

Now back to our corners!

Sal wrote:Looks like a nice cut of meat.

Did you allow it to reach room temp before throwing it on the grill?

Of course! I'm no rookie home chef. Those steaks sat out for 45 minutes in butcher paper before they hit the grill. I think they were just thicker filets than what I'm used to.

The doubles final is at 11 and uwf's #1 doubles team is in the final. The singles final is at 1pm.

I smile at the folklore of steak cooking.  I have a friend who is an engineer who uses a book to cook his steaks and takes their temp during the cooking process.  He is insane, and his steaks are consistently cooked poorly.....either too rare, or too well done.

I had three experiences observing how steaks are cooked in restaurants which specialize in steaks.   My first dish washing bus boy job I got to watch steaks being prepared and cooked.  First, they have a huge advantage with pro broilers.  Second, I NEVER saw a steak restaurant leave steaks out at room temp. for any period of time.  NEVER....NEVER.   In all three restaurants from cutting the steaks they were refrigerated and placed on trays which had wax paper placed over the trays.  One chef who I got to know pretty well and observed his process had people all over the chicago area coming for his butt steaks which he had marinate in the refrigerator before putting them on again the pro broilers.    When I would grab a steak out an put them on these broilers I had heat from both directions and the ability to sear by raising the broiler......I would cook my own steaks right out of the refrigerator and have never had better.   Quite honestly a steak on the backyard grill is usually a disaster.   I will take a good steak from a restaurant 100 to 1 because honestly the cuts of meat do not compare and reading a book and using inferior broilers or grills cannot be bridged by the average cook.

http://www.seriouseats.com/2013/06/the-food-lab-7-old-wives-tales-about-cooking-steak.html

The most important thing is to ask the five star restaurants where they buy their meats. I was on the house committee for years at a country club I belonged to and our membership had no use for poor quality steaks. About 70% of the steaks were ordered from Allen brother steaks. You pay two to five dollars more per steak from other prime meat suppliers, but the quality difference is simply without comparison. Yes, I have seen quality steaks from other top notch suppliers, but when it comes to meat, pay the premium and get quality. I would rather not eat a steak for a month than to pick one up at the local grocery store and cook the same on the backyard grill........give me a gun to blow my brains out. Less frequent steak eating, but quality experiences are a choice. After watching the theatrics of my friend for years going through his ritual, I do not even try to correct his insanity......I mean the steaks are edible and sometimes actually good, but it is hit and miss.....and miss is quite unpleasant.

Hey, I am not saying there is one way to cook a steak, but just a great deal of myth and superstition. If it works for someone..........stick to your method. However, it is comedic to watch an engineer cook a steak. We just laugh at the super bowl party each year......it is like flipping a coin......a fifty fifty proposition......he will not let anybody near the grill, and all these mythical steps he follows have us all getting a belly laugh each year for the last 40 years. He would always get piszed when I would just throw them on the grill from the fridge......not use a timer.....season them on the grill, and flop them on the plates near perfect......good cut of meat.....knowledge of your fire....understanding with experience thickness, and not trying to over season the meat to a particular taste......people have different tastes, and one size does not fit all.

We would go to Peg Leg's and get Oyster Rockefeller, and the engineer's wife would like clockwork grab the lemon and squeeze it over all the oysters without asking or thinking. My wife and I do not like lemon on Oysters, she likes lemon and assumes that everybody will enjoy her flavoring of the food. After years, my wife politely suggested she apply lemon to her oysters......her reply was.....I thought everybody wanted lemon on oysters......yep.....same story with steaks.

I can make a great steak in a cast iron skillet on the stove.


Optional sauted garlic onions and mushrooms ......still cooking.

[quote="Sal"]I don't care about the naysayers.

I was taught my technique by the head chef of Pat's Steakhouse in Louisville, Ky (give it a try, and you'll quickly learn why I trust him).

Remove the steak from the fridge 30 minutes before grilling and rub both sides generously with coarse sea salt.

Before grilling, brush both sides with clarified butter (you can also give it a dash of cracked black pepper and/or garlic powder, but it's really not necessary).

Grill time varies with the thickness of the meat.[/quote]

STOP THE PRESSES!

We agree on something! Although I do use Kosher salt as opposed to sea salt and I usually put a pad or two of herbed butter on top when I turn the steak over. Well worth the trouble to make clarified butter. I learned about that when watching the Galloping Gourmet, Graham Kerr, on TV fifty years ago.

I loved watching the Graham Kerr show. Didn't care about cooking but I thought he was one of the funniest people on late afternoon TV. Always remember him telling this joke quite a few years before SNL and decades before Howard Stern.