Steak - crispy on the outside and rare inside

[markk]

Now I realize that many people don't like their steaks rare, but that's not what I'm going to ask here.

I do, and I also like the exterior of the steak nice and crusty, some might say "charred", with a rare interior. It goes by such names as "Pittsburghed" or "Black and Blue" and several times recently I've had restaurants with the "wrong" grills (so they tell me) not be able to make me one, or bring me one that was badly overcooked and then replace it with one that was gray outside and rare inside.

But as my dining companion points out, why, no matter what degree of doneness you like the exterior of a steak cooked to, would you want a pale, grey exterior, instead of a nice seared, crispy, or even "charred" outside - that's how you get any steak in a serious steakhouse anyway. So what's the point of a few criscrossed markings on the outside of a steak that's otherwise grey.

I know that the grill marks simulate a real grill with a fire beneath it and the marks are where the metal grill gets as hot as a branding iron, but the heat from the fire also produces a fine sear on the outside of the meat as well.

So is there anybody that prefers these few grill marks to a nice crusty steak exterior, no matter how they like the inner doneness?

[WHT]

Without a high output broiler it will be tough. I can get it in my gas broiler if I get the space between flame and meat right.

[Irishgirl]

Screw the broiler. Put it in a smoking cast iron pan!

[Bueno]

Not the same. See: recent opening of Craftsteak.

[Chris Amirault]

Of course it's not the same, but for most home cooks without high-powered equipment, a smoking hot cast iron skillet with a big knob of lard is a pretty damned good option, and a lot better than sticking the meat under a weak gas broiler for many.

[Bree20]

Mark - I agree with you I can take a pass on the "correct" looking grill marks if the steak is cooked properly on the inside and out.

In fact I think sometimes it is ther way you were raised as how you like your steak - my son bless his heart was never given an option when given a steak either out or at home it is always rare! And now he will give anyone a dirty look when asked if he is sure he wants it cooked that way or thinks he does not understand the question!

We are lucky enough to beable to cook steaks properly at home much better quality and always cooked right.

[Fat Guy]

As I've noted in various discussions, I think heavily charred steaks are a mistake. Burning the outside of a high-quality piece of meat simply ruins it. I think there are three issues that contribute to this widespread palate confusion.

First, American steak-eaters' palates are calibrated towards charred steaks, but charred steaks are not actually good. Of course, most steaks aren't good either, so charring them may sort of help disguise that. But a $30-a-pound USDA Prime dry-aged steak? You don't want to mask that at all.

Second, there's the confusion between char and the Maillard reaction. The former is just burning. The latter is a form of browning that occurs due to the interaction between sugars and amino acids -- someone with better scientific background than I can explain non-enzymatic browning if necessary. It's the Maillard reaction you want on the exterior of your steak, not char.

Third, people generally don't grasp how to produce the desirable Maillard reaction. It's not a question of applying brute-force heat. You don't need a steakhouse broiler or a charcoal fire to produce a gorgeously Maillardized steak. You don't even need a cast-iron skillet heated to a villion degrees. You just need a relatively hot pan and plenty of the right kind of fat -- butter, for example, is an excellent trigger for the Maillard reaction.

I have demonstrated this technique countless times for people: butter plus moderately high heat makes a delicious crust; super-heated cast-iron skillet with oil just burns the steak (as do most of the favored steakhouse methods). That's why many of the best chefs, such as Alain Ducasse, prefer to use copper skillets to sear, and then finish the steaks in an oven.

[Holly Moore]

Perhaps it is my mutated DNA. As much as I enjoy a steak as Steven described (though Maillarding has all the appetite appeal of denaturing one's protein), the caveman left within me also ravishes a classic Pittsburgh steak - the mingling flavors and sensations of rare meat, bloody fatty juice, and charcoaled crust.

Having long ago acquired a restaurant salamander atop my Garland, such savage treatment of a thick ribeye is within my grasp.

Edited October 27, 2007 by Holly Moore (log)

[JimH]

When I switched from gas to charcoal I stopped burning steaks. I pile the charcoal so it's about 2 inches below the grill and take the steak straight from the frig to the grill. 4 minutes per side and off to rest for 5 minutes or more. The outside is brown and crusty the inside is caveman red. Makes me want to go look for woman to drag back to cave.

[judiu]

I never thought about it before, but that's the way I like my hamburgers, too. Nice and thick, cooked in a frying pan with a nice knob of butter. Crusty brown outside and damn near raw inside. Served on buttered toasted onion rye bread.Yum! And I only get them that way when I fix them at home, dammit!

[markk]

As I've noted in various discussions, I think heavily charred steaks are a mistake. Burning the outside of a high-quality piece of meat simply ruins it. I think there are three issues that contribute to this widespread palate confusion.

First, American steak-eaters' palates are calibrated towards charred steaks, but charred steaks are not actually good. Of course, most steaks aren't good either, so charring them may sort of help disguise that. But a $30-a-pound USDA Prime dry-aged steak? You don't want to mask that at all.

Second, there's the confusion between char and the Maillard reaction. The former is just burning. The latter is a form of browning that occurs due to the interaction between sugars and amino acids -- someone with better scientific background than I can explain non-enzymatic browning if necessary. It's the Maillard reaction you want on the exterior of your steak, not char.

Third, people generally don't grasp how to produce the desirable Maillard reaction. It's not a question of applying brute-force heat. You don't need a steakhouse broiler or a charcoal fire to produce a gorgeously Maillardized steak. You don't even need a cast-iron skillet heated to a villion degrees. You just need a relatively hot pan and plenty of the right kind of fat -- butter, for example, is an excellent trigger for the Maillard reaction.

I have demonstrated this technique countless times for people: butter plus moderately high heat makes a delicious crust; super-heated cast-iron skillet with oil just burns the steak (as do most of the favored steakhouse methods). That's why many of the best chefs, such as Alain Ducasse, prefer to use copper skillets to sear, and then finish the steaks in an oven.

←

Sure, I'll take your Maillard reaction steak over a grey one with a few decorative, branding-ironed grill marks any day! And I'll certainly take a steak crisped to sear it in it's own rendered fat and then finished off another way. That's not what I was saying. So I re-phrase, who'd want a steak gray and not with Maillard reaction sear, even if you don't want a char?

I don't usually use the words Pittsburgh when I order _ I try to ask for seared crispy on the outside and rare inside - they always come back with "Pittsburghed" or "black and blue", and I still opt for that over grey. The only steak I like with some actual "char" is a fatty one like a ribsteak, where the dripping gratuitous fat does cause some flare ups, though I'd like the steak not to burn to a crisp in an oil fire, but I do like the good bit of char that such a steak gets over an open fire when it's controlled well. And when the flame is controlled with sand (a la Fiorentina) you still get a ferocious amount of heat searing and browning the steak uniformly.

I was just asking, "who'd want a grey exterior, ever?" because I was served one the other night.

Edited October 27, 2007 by markk (log)

[Fat Guy]

If it's a good steak I'll definitely take gray over burnt. At least when it's gray there's nothing ruining the flavor of the steak.

[budrichard]

Actually I think it the definition of rare an how you get there that is more important than the char or lack of char.

Most think that rare means blood red when infact that is raw. Rare, can only happen with a nice crusty exterior in a thick steak, usually about 3" or more. We get a nice crust, not charred or burnt and cook until the interior is judged right, usually meat thermometers don't help because there is just not enough steak to get a good temperature.

Anyway, we then cover and rest for at least 20 minutes to much longer if a large roast. The rare we obtain is nice pink uniform color.

It is not possible to get a nice crust and a rare or even raw, for the matter, interior in a thin steak.-Dick

Edited October 27, 2007 by budrichard (log)

[Jane Die]

I fall into the cavewoman camp.

A 1-1/2 inch thick NY Strip cooked over ripping hot hardwood charcoal really fast until the center is no longer blue and not quite medium rare, but somewhere in that narrowly sublime warm and juicy red place. It comes off the grill sizzling with a nice brown crust, but not charred. I loosely cover it with tin foil and let it rest for 5 minutes.

Edit: I just push on the meat to test for doneness. I don't like sticking thermometers in the meat because then you really will lose all that beautiful juicyness.

Edited October 27, 2007 by Jane Die (log)

[markk]

If it's a good steak I'll definitely take gray over burnt. At least when it's gray there's nothing ruining the flavor of the steak.

←

We may in fact disagree on this one (it'd be our first, too ), but when the fat sizzles and crisps, are you considering that burnt?; and are you considering 'black and blue' burnt?

I consider burnt when I can taste burned char, like from a grease fire, when the steak tastes like the smell of a burned out building. That's unpleasant. But the crisping from sizzling fat causing the flames to lick it (in a controlled fashion) is not to me burnt. So where are you drawing your line.

I wasn't talking about people who leave the steak in a flare up for five minutes; on the other hand, I despise a grey exterior, so I'm just trying to zero in on where you call it burnt.

(I once had to send back a severely overcooked steak, in a place that later told me their chef had quit and was operating without one, because the next steak that came out totally grey was followed by the explanation from the manager that the remaining people in the kitchen were afraid to cook my next steak and came up with the idea of tossing it back and forth between two very hot plates until the outside turned grey as their protection against overcooking it - honest, this happened. Would you have gone for that?)

PS - I'm not being argumentative, though it may sound it, just trying to zero in on the grey area.

[Holly Moore]

First, from Wikapedia,

Grey became the established British spelling in the 20th century, pace Dr. Johnson and others,[80] and is but a minor variant in American English, according to dictionaries. Canadians tend to prefer grey. Some American writers[citation needed] tend to assign wistful, positive connotations to grey, as in "a grey fog hung over the skyline", whereas gray often carries connotations of drabness, "a gray, gloomy day."

I'm of the gray as in drab or gloomy school when it comes to steak. Usually means the steak has been sliced too thin to cook a proper rare or medium rare with brown or charred edges. Also could be cooked at too low a temperature, stewing as much as grilling.

I agree that charred should not be taken to mean burned to a crisp. Rather just to the point that the charring starts to occur. Charred beef has a distinct flavor that compliments the inside of the steak. Done right, or at least to my taste, a properly charred steak is not "black and blue." Rather brown with a bit of char on the outside, and somewhere between rare and medium rare inside. That's more "Pittsburgh" to me than black on the outside and raw on the inside.

Edited October 27, 2007 by Holly Moore (log)

[JEL]

It is not possible to get a nice crust and a rare or even raw, for the matter, interior in a thin steak.-Dick

←

exactly.......so, for the people at home the lesson is to buy one forty dollar steak, rather than four ten dollar steaks that can't be cooked well......say feeding a family of four....

2-3 inches thick.......almost impossible to ruin..

[Holly Moore]

exactly.......so, for the people at home the lesson is to buy one forty dollar steak, rather than four ten dollar steaks that can't be cooked well......say feeding a family of four....

2-3 inches thick.......almost impossible to ruin..

←

Works for one guy who likes a good steak sandwich for lunch the next day or two, too.

[GlorifiedRice]

I love a medium rare filet or NY Strip with "GOLDEN CRUST" on both sides.

NOT charred, GOLDEN!

<pity me>

I got my steak makin' down to a science and My stupid ex would cut the crust off every damn time! Notice I said "EX"!

</pity me>

[Jane Die]

Did he ask that?  Did Mark ask "which is the best way to cook a steak for the home cook"?  He didn't.  He asked for a STATEMENT, or answer to a general inquiry.  So that's what coloured my reply.  No need for you to try and disqualify it.

*snap*

The answer, for me, would be NO to gray meat with "grill marks" and YES to crispy crusty meat exterior.

[mizducky]

Thinking about it, I seem to like my steak done a variety of ways--most of the time I'll go for medium-rare (and in restaurants I'll often add "rather more rare than medium). But often I'll go for more rare to raw. It kind of depends on my mood, and random cravings, and maybe the phase of the moon. And I think it also depends on the cut of meat ... and to a certain extent, nostalgia.

When I was a kid, my folks' favorite charcoal grill fodder was a big ol' seven-bone chuck steak, either marinated or seriously worked over with the meat tenderizer or slathered with barbeque sauce, and then slung low over a hot bed of the Kingsford. Lotsa flareups! Dad was not shy about pulling it while it still had lots of blood, but of course it also got lots of charred bits, especially if it got the barbeque sauce treatment. And I really loved the contrast of the juicy fatty meat and, yes, the bitterness of the charred bits.

Don't get me wrong, I totally love a properly Maillarded red-in-the-middle steak too. But yeah, that cavewoman streak ...

Now I don't like gray cooked-to-death meat any more than Mark the OP, but interestingly I do like that medium-rare point as a distinct alternative to rare-rare. To me, it's that point where the meat still has lots of juiciness, but the proteins have denatured just enough that the meat presents some modest resistance to the tooth--and I do really dig that kind of borderline tender/chewy mouthfeel.

[scubadoo97]

Screw the broiler.  Put it in a smoking cast iron pan!

←

If I'm not doing it over fire on the grill, I will use a flat cast iron pan over a grill pan. I want the entire surface to get a crust.

[Fat Guy]

If it's a good steak I'll definitely take gray over burnt. At least when it's gray there's nothing ruining the flavor of the steak.

←

We may in fact disagree on this one (it'd be our first, too ), but when the fat sizzles and crisps, are you considering that burnt?; and are you considering 'black and blue' burnt?

←

Every black-and-blue steak I've had has been, to me, unpleasantly charred. I certainly don't mind a little taste of the fire, but it would be unusual to see a black-and-blue steak done that subtly.

I have no problem with a steak with zero crust. I'm happy to have a steak put in a sous-vide bag, brought to the exact right temperature all the way through, and served. A nice Maillardized crust is a plus, and perhaps a hint of char is acceptable or even desirable, but I'd rather have no crust than anything that tastes charred. The no-crust scenario at least allows one to taste the meat.

[GlorifiedRice]

So I take it that Fat Guy wouldnt like sugar caramelized scallops?

[Fat Guy]

Caramelized, Maillardized and charred are three different things. I'm in favor of the first two, just not the third.