Love everything about a steak house but the bill? Chef Craig Koketsu of NYC resaurant Quality Meats shares how to prepare delicious steaks at home for a fraction of the price.
Pick your beef
Step one of planning your steak night is casting your guest star (aka your cut of meat). Next time you swing by your butcher at the supermarket, keep this in mind:
Know what to look for - Color The meat should be bright red, with no hints of gray or brown (a sign that it’s not fresh).
- Fat Ladies, this isn’t the time to go fat-free. Marbling, or white flecks of fat, means more flavor.
- Thickness Make sure you buy beef that’s at least 1½ inches thick all around, particularly when you’re choosing porterhouse. If it’s too thin, it’ll cook through very quickly and won’t have the chance to develop a flavorful browned crust.
Get good grades - Prime The highest quality, you’ll find it at good meat markets. You’ll pay more for its marbling, which is key when you’re choosing a cut like NY strip. Also, opt for Prime porterhouse to ensure the strip side will have marbling.
- Choice A notch below Prime, you can get away with Choice when you buy a tender cut, like filet mignon, or a naturally marbled cut, such as rib eye.
- Select You’ll save a few bucks, but Select is the driest and least flavorful, so it’ll need extra marinating.
Ask your butcher about dry-aging
At quality supermarkets, look for porterhouse, rib eye and NY strip that have been dry-aged for 21 days. This process involves hanging the beef in a cooler, which evaporates moisture from the muscle and breaks down tissue, concentrating flavor in the meat and tenderizing it. And don’t freak out if you detect a stronger smell—it’s from the aging process.
Don’t buy into the hype
You may have heard that Wagyu beef (Kobe comes from Wagyu cattle) and Certified Angus are the grand poobahs of beef. They have a very high fat content and great taste, but you’ll still get big flavor from Prime and Choice. Bottom line: Don’t waste your dough.
Know your cuts - Filet mignon An extremely tender cut, it comes from the prized tenderloin area of the cow. Because of its very low fat content, it dries out easily and must be cooked right to lock in the juices.
- Porterhouse This cut offers the best of both worlds: a T-shaped bone with meat from the short loin on the larger side (strip steak), and tenderloin (filet mignon) on the smaller side.
- NY strip A steak house favorite, this no-nonsense cut comes from the strip loin (further down on the short loin). Since the strip is all muscle, choosing a Prime cut is key.
- Rib eye The most succulent cut due to its marbling, rib eye comes from the rib. The larger the “eye,” or dominant area of meat on the steak, the better. If you buy bone-in rib eye, you’ll get even more flavor.
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-- Riann Smith
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