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How I like my steak:

by Petruchio (Vicar)
on Aug 03, 2007 at 22:25 UTC ( [id://630576]=poll: print w/replies, xml ) Need Help??

Vote on this poll

Raw
[bar] 24/5%
Rare
[bar] 46/10%
Medium Rare
[bar] 149/31%
Medium
[bar] 59/12%
Medium Well
[bar] 61/13%
Well Done
[bar] 49/10%
Burnt
[bar] 10/2%
On someone else's plate... yuck!
[bar] 17/4%
Inside a Happy Cow
[bar] 69/14%
484 total votes
Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: How I like my steak:
by grinder (Bishop) on Aug 03, 2007 at 23:16 UTC

    The French cut up beef carcasses in a completely different manner to the English and American, so they have cuts that is next to impossible to obtain outside of France.

    My favourite is the piece known as "la hampe", which is the muscle under the gut that holds the belly in place. It's a long stringy muscle, more so than "onglet" or "bavette". It needs to age for a week or so, and then you sear it over a hot griddle for about 30 seconds. It has a very distinctive flavour and is simply divine. After you get used to it, all other beef cuts seem very bland.

    • another intruder with the mooring in the heart of the Perl

      In the United States we call "la hampe" the "hanger steak". It happens to be a cheap cut of meat, simply because people don't know how wonderful it is. It shows up on restaurant menus for 20-30 US dollars, but costs two dollars a pound wholesale (for prime).

      "La hampe" is actually easy to find in my neighborhood, where I can find it for five dollars a pound, retail!

      I agree whole heartedly that it is a fantastic cut, needs a little aging, works well when cooked quickly, and it takes a marinade very well.

      I'm glad you brought up this often overlooked, yet wonderful cut.

      -- Douglas Hunter
Re: How I like my steak:
by dsheroh (Monsignor) on Aug 04, 2007 at 16:34 UTC
    "Inside a Happy Cow"

    Cannibal cows? Cool.

      Cannibal cows

      Sounds like a new Nickelodeon cartoon ...

      --
      tbone1, YAPS (Yet Another Perl Schlub)
      And remember, if he succeeds, so what.
      - Chick McGee

        Well, it wasn't a whole cartoon; but the subject has been breached.

        Rocko's_Modern_Life

        The character "Heifer" was raised by wolves, and could often be found at Chokey Chicken eating hamburgers.
        Sounds more like Mad Cow Disease to me

                        - Ant
                        - Some of my best work - (1 2 3)

Re: How I like my steak:
by kyle (Abbot) on Aug 03, 2007 at 22:39 UTC

    I like my steaks frequent, tasty, and with good company.

Re: How I like my steak:
by shmem (Chancellor) on Aug 04, 2007 at 11:57 UTC
    Rare. I hate television, and as Fred Allen said -
    Television is a medium because anything well done is rare.

    --shmem

    _($_=" "x(1<<5)."?\n".q·/)Oo.  G°\        /
                                  /\_¯/(q    /
    ----------------------------  \__(m.====·.(_("always off the crowd"))."·
    ");sub _{s./.($e="'Itrs `mnsgdq Gdbj O`qkdq")=~y/"-y/#-z/;$e.e && print}
Re: How I like my steak:
by apl (Monsignor) on Aug 05, 2007 at 13:41 UTC
    On a regular basis. Vegetables are what real food eat.
Re: How I like my steak:
by ysth (Canon) on Aug 04, 2007 at 02:01 UTC
    "On someone else's plate" is vegetarian, while "Inside a Happy Cow" is PETA?
      Or, to paraphrase comedian Jim Gaffigan,

      "Do you know what they do to those cows?"
      "No, but it's delicious."

      --
      tbone1, YAPS (Yet Another Perl Schlub)
      And remember, if he succeeds, so what.
      - Chick McGee

      PETA: "People for the Eating of Tasty Animals"?

      CountZero

      A program should be light and agile, its subroutines connected like a string of pearls. The spirit and intent of the program should be retained throughout. There should be neither too little or too much, neither needless loops nor useless variables, neither lack of structure nor overwhelming rigidity." - The Tao of Programming, 4.1 - Geoffrey James

Re: How I like my steak:
by gloryhack (Deacon) on Aug 04, 2007 at 03:36 UTC
    Medium rare, grilled over a very hot fire of mesquite or a fruit wood. I only get three or four steaks a year, so it's absolutely got to be right!

      The best thing I've found for cooking steak is "mesquite carbon". When I've found it it came in bland paper bags looking like some really cheap, suspect brand of charcoal briquettes perhaps from Mexico. It was charcoal made from chunks of mesquite branches, still in the original "branch" shapes. You use it just like other types of charcoal: throw it in a pile, add something to get it hot enough to get burning, spread out the glowing coals, then cook the meat suspended over it.

      A steak cooked over mesquite carbon with not a pinch of anything added, not even salt, tastes better than the best marinated, seasoned steak I've had. The steaks I've cooked over this so simply were even better than the steaks I've had at one of the best (now all closed) steak chains in Texas that cooked over mesquite wood.

      So simple and so cheap (quite a bit cheaper than regular charcoal, as I recall) and yet I've never seen anyone else using it. I should see if I can buy that stuff this far north. I haven't had a good steak in a while.

      - tye        

        That's my primary cooking wood :-) North of the border, it's called "mesquite lump charcoal". If you can't find it locally, you can buy it online.

        I've even seen the stuff at K-Mart in big black plastic bags. Don't recall the brand name on it just now, but it was the real thing.

        Happy grillin!

Re: How I like my steak:
by margulies (Friar) on Aug 05, 2007 at 00:09 UTC
    Huummm, steak.
    Delicious, in every way. But best in barbecues...
Re: How I like my steak:
by gregor42 (Parson) on Aug 07, 2007 at 12:49 UTC
Re: How I like my steak:
by blue_cowdawg (Monsignor) on Aug 07, 2007 at 14:55 UTC

    One of my favorite things to do at a restraunt is tell the waitstaff "knock off the hooves, pull off the hide and run through the kitchen with it. I want it really rare!" Mostly I do that because there are too many dining establishments that don't seem to understand what rare is.

    Making steak at home I normally use a rib-eye cut that I prepare with an herbed butter smeared on it right before it gets put on the grill over lump charcoal at a real high heat. The outside gets seared well and the insides remain good an juicy and stays the way I like it.

    This technique is not for the faint of heart because as the butter melts off the steak from the heat flames that reach as high as 8 feet leap from the grill adding to the searing effect. Hair on fore-arms can become a casualty if you aren't careful. My neighbors have given up on panicking about it and no longer call the fire department to report a forest fire behind my house.

    I am also fond of cooking steaks over a wood fire when camping. Just don't make the mistake that a friend of mine did by building a fire from pine branches and trying to cook with it. The results taste like turpentine and are a perfectly good waste of a good steak. Perefectly good waste of a bad steak (if such a thing exists) as well.

    Use hardwood, bonus points if you can find fruit woods such as apple or cherry and even hickory, pecan or walnut work well. For that matter any hardwood will do.

    Blue Cowdawg's Herbed Butter

    Ingredient List
    QtyItem
    2 sticksUnsalted butter, softened.
    3 TGarlic powder
    3 TOnion powder
    4 THungarian Hot Paprika
    2 TBlack Pepper; freshly ground
    3 TDried Oregano
    1 TCumin
    1/2 tCayenne pepper; more if desired
    Procedure
    Combine all ingredients in a non-reactive bowl. Place in refrigerator to allow to get firm but not completely solid. Divide and use half to spread on steaks before putting on fire. Use other half to put a dollop on top of steak when it is done just before serving

    Peter L. Berghold -- Unix Professional
    Peter -at- Berghold -dot- Net; AOL IM redcowdawg Yahoo IM: blue_cowdawg
Re: How I like my steak:
by Aim9b (Monk) on Aug 07, 2007 at 18:50 UTC
    Filet Mignon, Wrapped in bacon, Mesquite Grilled, with just a bit of garlic butter. You'll need neither fork NOR spoon.
Re: How I like my steak:
by belg4mit (Prior) on Aug 05, 2007 at 03:14 UTC
    Lightly charred. Medium will do, but definitely *not* the missing option of steak tartar :-P

    --
    In Bob We Trust, All Others Bring Data.

      Yeah, I prefer my meat cooked. I'm not fond of the idea of getting beef tapeworm.


      emc

      Information about American English usage here and here.

      Any New York City or Connecticut area jobs? I'm currently unemployed.

        Yeah, I prefer my meat cooked. I'm not fond of the idea of getting beef tapeworm.

        You say tapeworm like it's a bad thing. There has been some evidence to suggest that parasites may help to control asthma (warning -- do NOT read past the "The Decision to..." if you have a weak stomach).

        Personally, I'm okay with raw meat, in some circumstances. The less clean the restaurant is, the more well done I want my food cooked (and if it's not looking acceptable, sometimes it's best to go somewhere else) -- but if it's a well established, clean and busy Ethiopian restaurant, (or I'm with someone who speaks the language and they feel comfortable there), I'm willing to eat Gored Gored.

As Mr. Buffet Said, ...
by tbone1 (Monsignor) on Aug 06, 2007 at 11:59 UTC
    I like mine with lettuce and tomato, Heinz 57 and french fried potato.

    --
    tbone1, YAPS (Yet Another Perl Schlub)
    And remember, if he succeeds, so what.
    - Chick McGee

Re: How I like my steak:
by Errto (Vicar) on Aug 07, 2007 at 02:46 UTC

    My parents make a grilled steak marinated in the incongruous combination of soy sauce, red wine vinegar, lemon juice and, the kicker, Worcestershire sauce. Then grilled medium rare. Friggin' good, I tell ya.

    Other favorite, also from my upbringing. Brisket cooked for a solid couple of hours in a pot with sauteed onions and tomatoes, some parsley and garlic for flavor, and a generous pour of red wine (water for the rest of the liquid required).

      That marinade sounds a bit like adobo, which happens to be the best flavor in the world.

      ---
      It's all fine and dandy until someone has to look at the code.
Re: How I like my steak:
by stonecolddevin (Parson) on Aug 05, 2007 at 22:32 UTC

    Burnt to a crisp with some delish heinz 57, mmm MMMM.

    meh.
Re: How I like my steak:
by talexb (Chancellor) on Aug 08, 2007 at 03:12 UTC

    I can remember a great sign over a BBQ place in San Francisco from when I visited in 1982 -- "We'll cook you a steak rare, medium rare (my choice), medium, or medium well, but we absolutely refuse to cook you a steak well-done."

    I like that.

    And, of course, with a lovely glass of rich red wine. :)

    Alex / talexb / Toronto

    "Groklaw is the open-source mentality applied to legal research" ~ Linus Torvalds

      We have a burger place here that will serve medium rare by default. They also do well done if you tell them to, but it's only because one year the health department came by and said they couldn't refuse to "thoroughly" cook the meat. They call it a hockey puck and if the old guy's in a bad mood, he'll brandish his knife at you for ordering it.

      They also supposedly invented the hamburger, or at least the American incarnation of it. Oh, and they don't carry ketchup.

        Of course that's were the hamburger was invented. That it may have been independently invented in dozens of other places is irrelevant 8-)


        emc

        Information about American English usage here and here.

        Any New York City or Connecticut area jobs? I'm currently unemployed.

        I try to keep my burger on the edge of the grill when I cook for my wife and two step-sons so I get medium rare, but that's not possible with the factory-made burgers -- they're not nearly as tasty, but they are way less work.

        My latest batch of hand-made burgers contained diced onion and garlic, along with oregano, paprika, chili powder, pepper and salt. They fell apart a little on the grill (perhaps an egg as binder next time) but tasted great.

        Alex / talexb / Toronto

        "Groklaw is the open-source mentality applied to legal research" ~ Linus Torvalds

      Such as? (always interested to hear people's wine choices.)
      http://www.mpwilson.com/uccu/

        Well, this is way off-topic, but I was introduced to the Baco Noir grape about ten years ago by a girlfriend I had at the time, and loved the rich flavour. Henry of Pelham in the Niagara region does amazing things with this grape. So therefore a Pinot Noir is also welcome.

        My wife and I are on our second double batch of wine from a store called Fermentations on Danforth -- I think we paid $300 and got 60 bottles of red. It's not vintage, and you can't drink it right away, but after 2-3 months it is quite definitely drinkable and very pleasant. We have a Pinot Grigio (I think) and a Merlot (blended with another grape, I forget).

        It's sort of like open source wine. ;)

        Alex / talexb / Toronto

        "Groklaw is the open-source mentality applied to legal research" ~ Linus Torvalds

Re: How I like my steak:
by tweetiepooh (Hermit) on Aug 08, 2007 at 10:30 UTC
    I had to answer raw as rare is too well done.

    A pub in Slough used to do really good rump steaks for around £3 on Monday and Tuesday lunch times and the chef knew exactly how to do it "still twitching". Nice and crisp on the inside, barely warmed in the middle. Some work collegues would not site next to me if I had steak.

    I like to serve steak coated with oregano and pepper and some lemon on the side to squeeze over. Good meat, hung for a couple of weeks really doesn't need much fuss.

Re: How I like my steak:
by tirwhan (Abbot) on Aug 05, 2007 at 14:16 UTC
      Everything in moderation.
      -- gam3
      A picture is worth a thousand words, but takes 200K.
Re: How I like my steak:
by Gavin (Archbishop) on Aug 08, 2007 at 17:56 UTC
    In a Big Burger .
    I did this drawing in Adobe Freehand MX for a poster advert.
Re: How I like my steak:
by punch_card_don (Curate) on Aug 09, 2007 at 17:59 UTC
    Alex Trebek: A degree of cooking for steaks, or a sissy pirate saying goodbye.

    Contestant: What is "tar-tar for now!".

Re: How I like my steak:
by mr_mischief (Monsignor) on Aug 09, 2007 at 14:21 UTC
    At a real steak place, I usually order "rare" or "blue" (being something between steak-house rare and raw). Most places, I have to order "extra rare" to get what most steak places call rare. The term "blue" is not well enough known to order it that way many places.

    Basically, my steak should have the gray/brown creep up to about halfway on one side before being turned. Once there's no red on the edges of the steak, it's to be served.
Re: How I like my steak:
by sir_lichtkind (Friar) on Aug 10, 2007 at 14:03 UTC
Re: How I like my steak:
by Tux (Canon) on Aug 12, 2007 at 11:19 UTC

    I'm amazed noone said saignant yet. My fav way. Translated as "rare", "underdone", or (ther literal version) "bleedy". The meet just momentarily hits the pan to get a nice brown touch, but the inside still nicely bleads. Yummie!

    BTW no dressing for me, just a bit of (black) pepper and some (sea) salt.


    Enjoy, Have FUN! H.Merijn
Re: How I like my steak:
by Chaoszen (Initiate) on Jan 07, 2009 at 07:43 UTC
    I like my steak fresh. Really fresh. Obtaining "fresh" steak is a little like cow tipping. But I call obtaining really fresh steak "cow slicing". And if done correctly the cow lives to moo another day. You need a really sharp fillet knife and some lidocaine. By the cover of night you sneak up on a sleeping cow. Pick the spot on the cow that contains your favorite cut of meat. Carefully give the cow a shot of lidocaine in that area. Wait about 2 minutes and then swiftly slice off a prime cut. If done correctly the cow will never know it is missing anything.
Re: How I like my steak:
by jesuashok (Curate) on Aug 06, 2007 at 06:08 UTC
    without much oil added.


    i m possible

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