HOT! HOW TO COOK A STEAK...

Cooking a STEAK:

How do you

cook it????

Grill or Sauté:

Ok, lets start with GRILLING (on a BBQ) a piece of grass fed beef. Get your grill super hot!! Then salt and pepper your steak and whatever other seasoning you want. Add a little olive oil to your steak so it does not stick, then slap that sucker on the grill for a very short time.

Depending on how thick it is, cook it to your preference (I prefer rare, but I think you can get away with medium rare). But the trick when grilling is to cook it HOT and fast and of course DO NOT overcook. That’s why when you see a cook slap a piece of meat on the grill it smokes like hell!! Well, the grill is super hot. Since grass fed beef is leaner, (not tougher!), it cooks in less time, about 30% less. Cook to sear it, a few minutes each side. Then remove from the high heat (do not use a fork, this will let out the juices of the seared steak) and let cook on a lower heat for desired donesness. Here is a link to a Recipe adapted from Farmer and the Grill: A Guide to Grilling, Barbecuing and Spit-Roasting Grassfed Meat…and for saving the planet, one bite at a time, by Shannon Hayes, Left To Write Press, 2007

SAUTEING is much the same. You usually use clarified butter to sauté in. Clarified butter has the solids taken out so you can heat it to a super hot temp. Clarified butter actually flame burns but does not blacken (like the egg on drugs commercial that HAS the solids) but without solids you cook super hot and keep the flavor of the butter.

Get your pan nice and hot!! Add your clarified butter, then the meat. Cook to desired temperature and remove then add your red wine, shallots, onions or whatever you want butter then season and pour over your streak.

You can also blacken your steak!! Whatever it is, the trick is of course to never overcook which people do ALL the time and that’s the mistake. They also cook it to low in temp and the meat gets tough. Here is a link to describe "how to test the doneness of a steak," http://tinyurl.com/3nzjm

DIRECTIONS FOR MAKING CLARIFIED BUTTER:

Clarified butter is butter that has had the milk solids and water removed. One advantage of clarified butter is that it has a much higher smoke point, so you can cook with it at higher temperatures without it browning and burning. Also, without the milk solids, clarified butter can be kept for much longer without going rancid.

It is very easy to make. Melt the butter slowly. Let it sit for a bit to separate. Skim off the foam that rises to the top, and gently pour the butter off of the milk solids, which have settled to the bottom. A stick (8 tablespoons) of butter will produce about 6 tablespoons of clarified butter.

Another method is to simmer the butter in a saucepan until the mixture separates. After the water has evaporated, the milk solids will begin to fry in the clear butterfat. When they begin to turn golden, remove the pan from the heat and pour the butter through a fine strainer lined with damp cheesecloth into a heatproof container. If the cheesecloth is damp, all the butterfat will pass through, otherwise some will be absorbed by the cloth. This method is a little fussier, but produces a clearer result.