High end meat and fish: where to buy?

[Holly Moore]

I'm in, though not all that good at sharing.

Could a restaurant paying top price get a comprable porterhouse from Wells?

In the 90's I unsuccessfully pressured Jack McDavid to take the small retail space next to the Firehouse and open it up as a farmers market. He was getting outstanding lamb, produce and even beef from local farms the like of which I don't see available retail in Philadelphia.

Edited January 24, 2007 by Holly Moore (log)

[mrbigjas]

I'm thinking more and more that I should order a giant Lobel's porterhouse, a bunch of us should get together, each person chips in $10 or something, and everyone gets a bite of perfection. If you don't like it, or don't like it enough that you'd buy a whole steak, you won't have wasted much.

←

i kinda like that idea. however, i would make it more of a taste-off. order a giant lobel's porterhouse, go to ochs and get a giant porterhouse that's the dry-agiest thing they got. have jasonz get one of his cappuccio's joints. heck, get one from dibruno's new shop and whole foods' dry-aged stuff too.

maybe see if we can have someone get one from the good stuff esposito's sells to restaurants, although i guess that would miss the whole point of dagordon's original question about where we as consumers can just buy them.

everyone bring a cast iron pan and we'll go nuts.

after all, i trust the palates of the folks on here way more than i trust cook's illustrated's tasting crew.

[Tim Dolan]

The last few posts make WAY too much sense. I'd love to see this go down...

[MarketStEl]

Bring it. I'm in. Say where and when.

[dagordon]

I'm thinking more and more that I should order a giant Lobel's porterhouse, a bunch of us should get together, each person chips in $10 or something, and everyone gets a bite of perfection. If you don't like it, or don't like it enough that you'd buy a whole steak, you won't have wasted much.

←

i kinda like that idea. however, i would make it more of a taste-off. order a giant lobel's porterhouse, go to ochs and get a giant porterhouse that's the dry-agiest thing they got. have jasonz get one of his cappuccio's joints. heck, get one from dibruno's new shop and whole foods' dry-aged stuff too.

maybe see if we can have someone get one from the good stuff esposito's sells to restaurants, although i guess that would miss the whole point of dagordon's original question about where we as consumers can just buy them.

everyone bring a cast iron pan and we'll go nuts.

after all, i trust the palates of the folks on here way more than i trust cook's illustrated's tasting crew.

←

I'm totally down for that as well, though it would clearly be more expensive per person than the original idea of just Lobel's.

also, like jeffrey steingarten in the article mentioned above, i am of the belief that there is a single correct temperature at which a steak (from the short loin, at least) should be served -- steingarten says it's around 120, i think that's about right, perhaps 2 or 3 degrees cooler. acheiving this requires taking a lobel's size steak out of the oven when it's around 102 degrees in the center. steak temperature is ascertained using a polder thermometer inserted into the steak while it is cooking, and is verified with a Thermapen.

as you can see, this is quite a process. it's possible that having to cook multiple steaks at the same time will make my head explode, and, clearly, i don't have enough thermometers on hand to do temperature monitoring for more than 1 steak (and in a comparison it's going to be crucially important that each is cooked to the same doneness).

but maybe we can work something out

[wkl]

i have a polder thermometer that would gladly bring.maybe a bottle of barolo too

[guzzirider]

Hey... if supplying probe thermometers would help get me a seat at that tasting table, I've got 2 of 'em I can bring to the party! :-)

Seriously, though... I hope you guys can pull off a taste test like that. The results might be one of the more interesting things I've seen on eGullet in a while. I really like that idea... could be a regular feature here on eGullet. Sort of like Cooks Illustrated taste tests, only the tests by eGulleteers could be open for discussion afterwards.

__Jason

[mrbigjas]

i have a polder thermometer that would gladly bring.maybe a bottle of barolo too

←

yeah, what he said.

[Yannii]

i'd love to be involved ( i can offer thermometers, a thermal circulaotor and wine)

[Diann]

I haven't had the steak at Melograno, I have several times had the one at Pif, with truffle coulis or anchovy butter. I like it a whole lot. But it falls into a certain category of steak. The raw product is perfectly good, I think. But what makes the dish successful is the additional stuff they do to it.

It's completely different from what you might call the steakhouse steak category, where it's all about (or should be about!) doing as little as possible to the finest possible piece of meat.

I'm thinking more and more that I should order a giant Lobel's porterhouse, a bunch of us should get together, each person chips in $10 or something, and everyone gets a bite of perfection. If you don't like it, or don't like it enough that you'd buy a whole steak, you won't have wasted much.

←

I agree -- steak served vaguely Florentine style is a completely different beast from a truly transcendent steakhouse experience (I had that once, in Texas, of course) -- I was just trying to think of places in Philadelphia where I've ordered steak and really enjoyed it. No steakhouses come to mind.

Andrew -- I'm sure eating Chiannina beef IN Florence actually sitting UNDER the Tuscan sun enhances the experience of eating bistecca alla fiorentina -- so maybe don't get your hopes up too high for Melograno's version, but I do really like it. We should go sometime...

[philadining]

Yeah, that Melograno steak is surprisingly tasty, but I don't think it's really all about the meat. It's a nice, tender slice of beef, but it's too thin for that steakhouse vibe, which also accounts for its appeal: it's soaking up all sorts of great herby flavors from a white bean salad beneath.

It's one of my favorite steaks in the city, but as others have noted, it's not going to satisfy someone looking for that classic steakhouse slab-o-meat.

The entrecote at Pif gets closer, that was a big, thick steak, left mostly on its own, but probably wouldn't have been as much of a thrill without the sauce beneath and compound butter melting-in from on top.

We had a few disappointing reports on Barclay Prime a ways back, but they mostly centered on the bizarre way they split the legendary rib-eye. Anybody indulged in an unsullied Gachot Ribeye there? If so, can you make any comparisons?

As with many on this list, if I'm going to drop serious coin on a meal, I generally prefer something more interesting than a piece of broiled meat on a plate, so I have not bothered with the expensive steakhouse thing. But I'd chip-in on a steak smackdown in one of our kitchens...

[dagordon]

We had a few disappointing reports on Barclay Prime a ways back, but they mostly centered on the bizarre way they split the legendary rib-eye.  Anybody indulged in an unsullied Gachot Ribeye there? If so, can you make any comparisons?

I've had it, it was quite good, I think by far the closest thing to what I'm looking for in Philly. But not quite there. For one thing, as I've said, I'm more of a short loin guy, in part because, I've found, unless you get a rib steak that's pretty close to the short loin, as opposed to closer to the chuck, it can be unpleasantly fatty (as in pockets of inedible fat). And the ribeye I had at Barclay suffered this problem.

As with many on this list, if I'm going to drop serious coin on a meal, I generally prefer something more interesting than a piece of broiled meat on a plate, so I have not bothered with the expensive steakhouse thing.

←

I have to say that I don't understand this. When you say something "more interesting", are you talking about the organoleptic experience of eating it, or the preparation of it?

I do think that organoleptically the experience of eating a piece of fantastically high quality steak is pretty "interesting". In particular the dry aged funkiness overlaid on the more familiar beefy flavors, and the sublimely tender texture that beef usually doesn't have. Again, maybe the difference of opinion is due to the fact that you've never had a steak of the quality under discussion?

If "more interesting than a piece of broiled piece of meat on a plate" is referring to preparation, do you generally not like to spend money on, say, fantastic traditional style sushi, which might be described as "cut up raw fish on rice"?

Sometimes what's "interesting" about food is how amazing an exceptionally high quality ingredient can be, prepared very simply.

[Tim Dolan]

We had a few disappointing reports on Barclay Prime a ways back, but they mostly centered on the bizarre way they split the legendary rib-eye.  Anybody indulged in an unsullied Gachot Ribeye there? If so, can you make any comparisons?

←

I had posted about the unusual split job, but fortunately I was able to get back there and have one all to myself. Obviously it was much, much better than the split version, and I'd have to say it cracked my top 5 list of "best steaks ever". I'm ashamed to admit this, but I didn't finish it. I had a big lunch that day and over-estimated my appetite that night, but I distinctly remember that I was already thinking about taking the leftover steak home and eating it the next day before I even left the restaurant. I would say that it met my expectations, but at $50 a pop it's kind of a once or twice a year thing for me.

[philadining]

I have to say that I don't understand this. When you say something "more interesting", are you talking about the organoleptic experience of eating it, or the preparation of it?

I do think that organoleptically the experience of eating a piece of fantastically high quality steak is pretty "interesting". In particular the dry aged funkiness overlaid on the more familiar beefy flavors, and the sublimely tender texture that beef usually doesn't have. Again, maybe the difference of opinion is due to the fact that you've never had a steak of the quality under discussion?

If "more interesting than a piece of broiled piece of meat on a plate" is referring to preparation, do you generally not like to spend money on, say, fantastic traditional style sushi, which might be described as "cut up raw fish on rice"? 

Sometimes what's "interesting" about food is how amazing an exceptionally high quality ingredient can be, prepared very simply.

←

It's not complicated: if I went to Yasuda or Masa and was served an entire pound of mind-bogglingly great O-Toro, and that's all, I'd be bored out of my skull no matter how great the ingredient is. And it's a similar thing for me with steak at steakhouses. The main attraction is a large amount of one thing. Personally that doesn't generally flip my switches. I've had some pretty fine pieces of beef in the course of tasting menus, and indeed a piece of relatively unadorned Snake River Farms beef at Per Se was one of my gustatory high points of the last few years. Can't say I had an organoleptic seizure or anything, but it was darn tasty... But my point is that I personally would have been pretty disappointed if my meal there had consisted entirely of a huge portion of that beef, no matter how good it was.

I'm not suggesting that the meat at Luger's or ordered from Lobel's or any of a myriad of "high end" steak experiences isn't good, or worth it to some people. I'm just saying that eating a large expanse of one thing, with maybe a couple of sides, doesn't especially appeal to me. It surely does to many people. Hence the many steakhouses in Philly, and any city, regardless of the presence or lack of "high end" meat.

I'm not claiming the product itself is inferior or that no gradations of quality exist, just explaining why I'm not making any comparisons between Barclay Prime, Lugers, whomever. I'm just not generally a steakhouse kind of guy. Not that I'm ruling-out a field trip to Luger's...

[Andrew Fenton]

As with many on this list, if I'm going to drop serious coin on a meal, I generally prefer something more interesting than a piece of broiled meat on a plate, so I have not bothered with the expensive steakhouse thing.

←

I have to say that I don't understand this. When you say something "more interesting", are you talking about the organoleptic experience of eating it, or the preparation of it?

I do think that organoleptically the experience of eating a piece of fantastically high quality steak is pretty "interesting". In particular the dry aged funkiness overlaid on the more familiar beefy flavors, and the sublimely tender texture that beef usually doesn't have. Again, maybe the difference of opinion is due to the fact that you've never had a steak of the quality under discussion?

Since I made a similar statement earlier, I'll respond. In my case, I tend to enjoy the experience of ingredients, even (or maybe especially) non-premium ingredients, that have been transformed through cooking into something better than what they were before. That is to say, I tend to be more interested in the sort of cooking that turns a tough piece of brisket into a melting delight than in the sort that takes a top-shelf piece of steak and turns it into a fine grilled steak.

That's not a hard-and-fast rule, there are any number of exceptions, and it's also personal preference, not something worth arguing over. But it's where I'm coming from.

If "more interesting than a piece of broiled piece of meat on a plate" is referring to preparation, do you generally not like to spend money on, say, fantastic traditional style sushi, which might be described as "cut up raw fish on rice"? 

Sometimes what's "interesting" about food is how amazing an exceptionally high quality ingredient can be, prepared very simply.

And to be honest-- I know it runs the risk of getting me lynched, but I'm not wild about Japanese food. There's nothing wrong with it; I just prefer other cuisines.

[dagordon]

I have to say that I don't understand this. When you say something "more interesting", are you talking about the organoleptic experience of eating it, or the preparation of it?

I do think that organoleptically the experience of eating a piece of fantastically high quality steak is pretty "interesting". In particular the dry aged funkiness overlaid on the more familiar beefy flavors, and the sublimely tender texture that beef usually doesn't have. Again, maybe the difference of opinion is due to the fact that you've never had a steak of the quality under discussion?

If "more interesting than a piece of broiled piece of meat on a plate" is referring to preparation, do you generally not like to spend money on, say, fantastic traditional style sushi, which might be described as "cut up raw fish on rice"? 

Sometimes what's "interesting" about food is how amazing an exceptionally high quality ingredient can be, prepared very simply.

←

It's not complicated: if I went to Yasuda or Masa and was served an entire pound of mind-bogglingly great O-Toro, and that's all, I'd be bored out of my skull no matter how great the ingredient is. And it's a similar thing for me with steak at steakhouses. The main attraction is a large amount of one thing. Personally that doesn't generally flip my switches. I've had some pretty fine pieces of beef in the course of tasting menus, and indeed a piece of relatively unadorned Snake River Farms beef at Per Se was one of my gustatory high points of the last few years. Can't say I had an organoleptic seizure or anything, but it was darn tasty... But my point is that I personally would have been pretty disappointed if my meal there had consisted entirely of a huge portion of that beef, no matter how good it was.

I'm not suggesting that the meat at Luger's or ordered from Lobel's or any of a myriad of "high end" steak experiences isn't good, or worth it to some people. I'm just saying that eating a large expanse of one thing, with maybe a couple of sides, doesn't especially appeal to me. It surely does to many people. Hence the many steakhouses in Philly, and any city, regardless of the presence or lack of "high end" meat.

I'm not claiming the product itself is inferior or that no gradations of quality exist, just explaining why I'm not making any comparisons between Barclay Prime, Lugers, whomever. I'm just not generally a steakhouse kind of guy. Not that I'm ruling-out a field trip to Luger's...

←

Yes, at a steakhouse (or at home, cooking a top quality steak), the steak should be the main attraction, but the meal should not consist entirely of a big slab of meat. Yes, that would be boring.

And it should be said that a piece of, say, Snake River Ranch beef at Per Se is NOT steakhouse steak, in the relevant sense (I made it a point earlier to remark that high quality Wagyu is really a different thing.) You can only have a small bit of this at a time due to the fat content. That is to say, a Luger's steak is not just a larger version of what you had. Two normal people cannot split a 36oz grade 11 wagyu Porterhouse. Although, I've never tried...

Just for future reference, the proper Luger's meal consist of

Tomatoes and onions, with the Luger's sauce, which does not seem to be identical to the bottled sauce sold everywhere

Bacon (ABSOLUTELY NOT TO BE MISSED)

followed by

lamb chops

followed by

Porterhouse for 2 x how ever many you need

followed by cheesecake w/ schlag

oh lord, forgot sides: creamed spinach, hash browns.

Edited January 25, 2007 by dagordon (log)

[MarketStEl]

Just wanted to report back on the sirloin roast I mentioned upthread.

Again, my purchase at Giunta's did not disappoint. The roast definitely had "abundant" marbling, enough to merit the grade of USDA Prime from what I could see, but only barely abundant--what would be termed "low Prime", right at 5 on that Japanese scale of 1 to 12.

I cooked it by brushing it with extra virgin olive oil, rubbing it with a little salt and encrusting it in crushed black pepper, then cooking it in a George Foreman contact roaster. It was tender and flavorful. It's also in the sandwich I made for lunch today.

Joseph Giunta informed me on Saturday that he now uses a local producer for his beef, John F. Martin & Sons of Stevens, Lancaster County. (I think I had purchased my sirloin roast before the switch.) The sirloin roast on display Saturday looked like it had less marbling--Choice, not Prime--but given the track record I've had so far with Giunta's meats, I'm not going to pass judgement on it until I've bought one and prepared it. So far, that shop has batted 1.000 on quality and value. (The sirloin roast is $4.99 a pound.)

Edited January 29, 2007 by MarketStEl (log)

[Lisa1349]

Spotted: Great quality meat.

Location: Downingtown Wegman's.

Type: Dry aged Prime strip steaks.

In cry-o-vac, easy to travel with long shelf life without freezing. $23.99/LB I will give these a try when I have a need for great meat. Their fish counter looked wonderful and fresh, but offerings were standard. I've noticed monkfish is getting harder to find, and more expensive. Poor man's lobster should be renamed exo-skeleton free lobster.

[Tim Dolan]

I could be 100% wrong about this, but for some reason I associate cry-o-vac with wet aging. Can anyone help me with the details?

[dagordon]

I could be 100% wrong about this, but for some reason I associate cry-o-vac with wet aging.  Can anyone help me with the details?

←

Yup in wet aging the beef is just put in a cryovac for a while...

But Wegmans and a lot of other places (Lobel's even) put their beef in cryovac bags for sale; this is after it's been dry aged.

Thanks, Lisa for the post. I mentioned last week that I had picked up great looking Prime dry aged strips at Wegmans Cherry Hill. They ended up being not so great. Tougher than I expected, and not much flavor.

The Wegmans stuff is just inconsistent, I think. And this is even keeping fixed what it looks like. We've had steaks from Wegmans that looked identical to what we had last week that were excellent.

Just goes to show you that even if it has all the right characteristics like Prime, dry aged, etc., and it looks really good, that doesn't guarantee quality...

Edited to say that I would have been happier with the meat if our had been $23.99/pound as opposed to the $30/pound that we paid. I'd be interested to hear what you think if you try the meat you described, Lisa...

Edited January 29, 2007 by dagordon (log)

[mrbigjas]

Again, my purchase at Giunta's did not disappoint. The roast definitely had "abundant" marbling, enough to merit the grade of USDA Prime from what I could see, but only barely abundant--what would be termed "low Prime", right at 5 on that Japanese scale of 1 to 12.

now, how would you know that? do you have meat grading experience that you haven't told us about?

[MarketStEl]

Again, my purchase at Giunta's did not disappoint. The roast definitely had "abundant" marbling, enough to merit the grade of USDA Prime from what I could see, but only barely abundant--what would be termed "low Prime", right at 5 on that Japanese scale of 1 to 12.

now, how would you know that? do you have meat grading experience that you haven't told us about?

←

Not at all. I'm just using that handy reference guide Andrew Fenton posted a link to back in Post #71. It's got lots of pretty pictures and all, and I think most of us can eyeball a cross-section of meat and make a link with one of the pretty pictures.

I should have qualified the above with an IMO.

[guzzirider]

I could be 100% wrong about this, but for some reason I associate cry-o-vac with wet aging.  Can anyone help me with the details?

←

Wegman's actually sells both. I've seen wet-aged in the cooler side-by-side with dry-aged, both in cryovac packages.

I haven't eaten enough of either from Wegman's to form an opinion on them, though. I think the last thing I bought from there (beef-wise) was skirt steak that I used with AB's fajita marinade. It was groin-grabbingly good, but I really have to attribute that to the marinade.

__Jason

[cinghiale]

Picked up some guanciale made from Berkshire jowls yesterday from d'Angelo's. Silky smooth, fatty, buttery, porky ($20/lb). A bit light on the cure, but definitely Sonny's best results to date. While the jowls were long in arriving, Sonny told me he regularly purchases significant butt-age, selling chops at $8/lb. The chops looked good, but I'm no Berkshire expert. Was in a hurry and neglected to ask about the provenance of the pork.

[mrbigjas]

butt-age?