Steak Secrets—How to Get the Most Out of Your Meat

Jonathan Luft, the executive chef who oversees Shula’s Steak House at the InterContinental Hotel in Tampa, Fla., doesn’t eat as much steak at home as he used to — after all, why bring your work home with you? Still, he grills about twice a month for his wife and two children, which means that he’s not immune to the prices of beef at the butcher shop and grocery store. Meat prices are 50 percent higher than they were a year ago because of the Midwest floods and the increased price of commodities used to feed cattle. For those who can’t afford the steakhouse experience, they can still cook with steakhouse flavor and get the most for their money. We asked Luft for tips on how to maximize a grocery budget by cooking the best steak possible at home.

1. Find a good butcher. Go to a trusted butcher to ensure you’re getting the highest-quality meat. Find someone who has different grades of meat so they can show you the difference.

2. Decide what you enjoy. This depends on what you like about steak. If you are into lean meat, then you want a tenderloin.

3. Let it breathe. You want to unpackage the meat and let it sit at room temperature for at least a half-hour before you grill it. That process, called “blooming,” allows oxygen to enter into the surface of the meat. The color of it will return to a brighter red, and there will be more flavor as a result. The steak will cook more evenly if the meat starts at room temperature than it would going directly from a cold refrigerator to a hot grill.

4. Time for seasoning. The rule here: You don’t want the seasoning you use to dominate the protein. Montreal Steak Seasoning, used sparingly, is a nice mix to start with, Luft says. And a little goes a long way. Sprinkle the seasoning on while the steak is blooming and then move it to the grill after about a half-hour.

5. Hit the grill. In the restaurant, cooks use a grill that is very hot. They mark the meat by searing it on the grill and then finish it in a convection oven. Cooking it this way allows for even heat to be applied in the convection oven.

6. Into the oven. After searing, put the meat into a convection oven, if possible. Shula’s puts its center-cut premium Angus steaks in at 450 degrees. The reason: The intense heat keeps the juice in the meat and seals it inside.

7. Give it a rest, then broil. Another secret: After cooking let the steak rest on the rack at room temperature for 5 to 10 minutes. After the rest period, put the steak under a broiler before serving to bring the external temperature up again. “When it’s cooking, everything tightens up,” Luft says. “If you were to cut into it right out of the oven, everything would pour out. When you let it rest, juices can go back into the steak ... You’re eating a piece of meat that is much more moist.”

8. Serve and enjoy. The level of doneness is another variable. Luft says he likes his steak “mid-rare but on the rare side of that” so he can taste the meat’s true flavor. “It just kills me when we get well-done orders,” he says. “They’re just ruining this great piece of meat. They’re cooking all the juice out of it. If you order it well-done, maybe it doesn’t matter so much where you go to eat because you’re just ruining it, it’s so tough.”

– Jeff Houck
Media General News Service