My wife and I are foodies of a sort. We are constantly seeking out good restaurants, often ethnic ones. We look for fun cooking classes, grow some of our own food, and visit farmers’ markets for fresh, pesticide-free fruit and vegetables. Dining opportunities are part of vacation planning, and we have enrolled in three international cooking schools . . . one in Spain, another in Portugal, and a third in the Yucatan. During my military stint in the Philippines, we prowled Third World markets and learned Philippine and Chinese cooking methods. We’ve experienced the cuisines of the world, and yet if I could choose my last meal, I would think seriously about having a perfectly cooked, juicy, medium-rare, dry-aged T-bone steak. It would be paired with Russian fingerling potatoes cooked in duck fat, seared baby asparagus spears, steamed organic baby carrots, and a genuine Caesar salad made with fresh egg yolk, anchovies, inner Romaine lettuce leaves, and homemade garlic croûtons.
It’s hard to beat a good steak. Over the years, we’ve cut down our intake of red meat, but when the carnivore in our ancestry does rumble, we want our meal to be a high-quality cut, and we want it cooked perfectly so the unique beef and fatty flavors are at their best.
I spent summers and a Christmas break or two on my aunt and uncle’s hardscrabble ranch in Coleman County, Texas. Leon and Mable grew corn, cotton, and winter wheat and ran thirty or forty head of cattle in good-grass years. Leon had a knack for picking the best young calves at the Brownwood Cattle Auction. They would be trailered home to graze his meager, mesquite-riddled pasture and then would be finished on feed corn before being sold in small lots to Coleman’s slaughterhouse. To the best of my knowledge, he didn’t use antibiotics, and the feed corn never saw a pesticide.
Leon’s beef was a cash crop and paid the bills. Occasionally, a younger steer would be sold to a local butcher in a barter-type deal. That cow would be processed and the meat wrapped and stored in an in-town meat locker, because in the early years, Leon didn’t have electricity and with it refrigeration. The best cuts were sold to people in town. When we wanted beef, which was usually hamburger, chuck, or rump for chicken-fried steak at breakfast, we picked it up at the meat locker. We couldn’t afford the better cuts, such as T-bones. On rare occasions, perhaps when my uncle sensed he had a good crop coming in and felt a little rich, he would take fresh eggs and what today would be called a free-range chicken to town for sweetening the pot and came home with fresh T-bones from the butcher.
He had an oven grate that came from a junked O’Keefe and Merit ranch range that was lined up on the pasture road with all the old dead tractors, combines, and binders that he had ever owned. It was a functional museum of sorts, because we cannibalized it for spare parts. He drove rebar stakes into our dry Texas backyard soil and wired that oven grate on them to make a barbeque grill. My job was to round up field rocks to build a fire ring and to gather deadfall mesquite from our adjacent pasture. Mable would handle those steaks as though they were her mother’s fine china. She made sure they came slowly up to room temperature, patted them dry with paper towels, and dusted both sides with salt and pepper and a few wisps of crushed red peppercorn from a barnyard tree.
Well before cooking time, Leon would light the mesquite so he would have a nice bed of coals for the steaks. Mesquite burns very hot, so there was a searing side and a lower-temperature finishing side under the grate. A rare cold Pearl beer might appear in his hand. Coleman County voted “dry” for the Baptists, but elected a “wet” sheriff. Leon let a bootlegger stash his wares in one of his ravines and was rewarded with a six-pack now and then.
Most West Texans like their meat fried and medium to well done, but not on steak days. Leon seared the steaks on one side for two minutes, flipped them for another two minutes, and then slid them over to the cooler part of the grill to finish. If a finger push told of the right firmness, he took out his pig sticker and made a small slice to make sure they were a juicy medium rare. Then they went to a platter to rest for a few minutes. We set up an outdoor table on sawhorses and covered it with a red checkered oilcloth from Woolworth’s. The meal would be served from bowls that held mashed potatoes and fresh steamed corn, slathered with our own churned butter. Another platter held fried okra from the same garden, and there was always a bowl of iceberg lettuce salad. After dinner, we would move to a front porch sited to catch a northeast breeze coming down from Santa Anna Mountain.
The kids knew that the front porch swing was reserved for Mable. It had been an anniversary gift. Our celebration wasn’t over, though. We had picked up extra ice and rock salt in town. Fresh diced peaches from Mable’s garden orchard married with a touch of vanilla, a dash of nutmeg and cinnamon, some sugar, and more of the same rich cream from our milk cows went into a metal canister that was surrounded with ice and rock salt in the ice cream maker. I would work the crank handle for what seemed like hours until it all firmed up, telling us that the cold ice cream was ready. Mable always had the honor of the first bowl. Later, a song might waft from an upright piano in the parlor, and Leon was always asked to tell a tall Texas tale. The nearest house was two miles away.
Mable and Leon were far from gourmets, but they knew the importance of tender care for their food products and the benefits of proper cooking. Whenever possible, they went with fresh produce and beef from a trusted source . . . their own herd.
Few of us have the luxury of raising and eating our own beef. Today, all American beef comes in three grades: prime, choice, and select. Only 2 percent of all meat is graded prime. It is very hard to obtain and is expensive. This meat is richly marbled with delicate grains of fat and produces the most tender and most flavorful meats. Most prime beef goes to fine restaurants and high-end butcher shops. I recently found that Costco sells prime tri-tip, though. It is several dollars more a pound, but worth the extra cost on occasion. Next in quality is choice. This is the meat that you get in most stores and butcher shops and can vary in quality, depending on where you buy it and its source. The lowest USDA grade is select. This beef has far less marbling and is tough. Still, it can work well if it is cooked slowly, braised or stewed. The dividing lines between different grades aren’t always black and white. Some choice could be better than some prime.
All three grades have been exposed to antibiotics, hormones, and feed-lot food sources. Most American beef comes from grass-fed animals, which are then trucked to a feed lot, where they are fattened up. Driving Interstate 5 between Los Angeles and the Bay Area, your nose will tell you when you pass several massive feed lots, or AFOs (animal feeding operations). You might not want to know what goes into the feed mixtures.
The only way to avoid the antibiotics and hormones in the beef you buy is to go to grass-fed and even “organic” beef, which is a leaner product, with what some call a “nutty” taste, but if you are really concerned, you need to know if and how the cow is finished. The definition of “finishing” varies. It can involve bundles of feed corn thrown from the back of a pickup into a pasture or a concentrated animal feeding operation (CAFO) with a variety of products centered on grain of some type.
How can you get through this labyrinth and pick out a great steak to cook at home or in camp? Start by having a relationship with a local butcher. An important question is “What is the age of this cut?” You want a minimum of three weeks of aging from the kill date. Beef can be dry aged, that is, hung in the air, or “wet aged,” with an entire strip or loin sealed in plastic. Most supermarket beef is wet-aged. Some butchers will dry age on request. It concentrates flavors by extracting moisture.
Once the larger pieces of meat that hang or are stored in the locker are cut into individual portions, it no longer has the mass necessary to age properly. You can’t age individual portions in the fridge. All they do is just get old, and that doesn’t improve the product. Often a particular cut of meat will be on sale. It may mean that this beef is nearing its time. It is still good, but may have been in the case for awhile. If you buy it, eat it right away.
For the best meat, never freeze beef. Freezing and thawing damages the cellular structure. If you won’t cook for a few days or are traveling to camp, ask to have the meat cryovac sealed. You may have to do that yourself. Sealed this way, beef will keep a week or more. Sometimes, though, you have to freeze beef. Double wrap it in plastic wrap and put it into a Ziploc bag or use a vacuum sealer. Thaw it gradually in a refrigerator or cooler. Never do a quick bath in hot water or thaw in a microwave.
It is not necessary to rinse a steak in water before cooking. Instead, dry the surface with paper towels. This will aid in developing a crust and caramelizing the surface layer, which aids flavor and texture.
A touch test can tell you the doneness of a steak. Lay your hand on a flat surface, palm side down. Touch a finger of your other hand to the surface between your thumb and index finger. That tension is what you’ll feel when prodding a rare-to-medium-rare steak. Clench your fist lightly. A touch in the same place will be what a medium-to-medium-well-done steak will feel like. The same touch in a tight fist suggests medium-well-to-welldone meat.
You may need a little practice to get this right. I check myself with an instant-read digital thermometer and have been known to double-check with a small knife cut and a f lashlight. For medium rare, pull beef from the fire at 118 to 125 degrees Fahrenheit.
Let the steak rest uncovered for a few minutes after cooking. The temperature will rise as much as 10 degrees. The final internal temperature, taken with an instant-read digital thermometer, should read 120 to 130 degrees for rare, 130 to 140 degrees for medium rare, 140 to 150 degrees for medium with a touch of pink, and 150 to 165 degrees for well done. As the steak rests, the juices will settle back into the meat. Otherwise, they will run all over the plate when you cut into it. Internal juices enhance flavor and tenderness. Beef needs some seasoning, even spice, to bring out the best flavors. Professional chefs in great steakhouses strive to develop a caramelized crust that isn’t tough, with a tender, moist, medium-rare interior. Many restaurants use only salt and pepper, while others use more complex rubs. Everybody’s taste buds and preferences are different, but be careful when lathering on excessive amounts of rub and spice. A top-quality cut of meat doesn’t need a lot.
At home, I cook a lot on an outdoor gas grill for convenience. In camp, I like to use oak and let it burn down, and I add briquettes to get an even fire. The Argentines, who are the greatest meat eaters in the world, build grills that allow non conifer hardwood to burn down to coals, which are raked to the front for grilling. Avoid direct flame, which can soot or smudge and cause the meat to cook unevenly. Flare-ups should be controlled with a spray bottle or even a plastic soda or water bottle that has a few punctures made with a pocket knife. If a steak has too much fatty rind, trim it down to avoid those greasy flare-ups. Above all, watch your meat constantly while it is on the grill. It’s easy to get involved with campfire or barbeque conversations, particularly if the fishing was good. Many a great cut of meat has been compromised by too many beers or glasses of wine.
Grilled Tomahawks
Tomahawks are bone-in rib steaks with the entire rib bone intact. The long rib bone is trimmed of fat and meat in a process called frenching. The steaks can weigh up to two pounds. They make a great presentation and can serve several people. Wayne, a fishing friend, is CEO of Cattlemens Restaurants. He and his chefs are always looking for tasty new ways of cooking meat. Here is how he does the tomahawk. He did several in camp at Davis Lake last year and then cut them into mouth-sized bits for appetizers. They were devoured by hungry anglers in several minutes.
Take one or more thick, bone-in-frenched rib steaks. Season generously on both sides with McCormick’s Grill Mates Montreal Steak Seasoning. Use a pie tin or flat plate and spread out a generous amount of cornstarch. Dip one side of the steaks at a time into the cornstarch and pat down. This steak can be cooked in a skillet, on a gas grill, or over a controlled bed of coals. The cornstarch-and-spice mixture binds with surface moisture of the meat and forms a tasty crust that complements the beefy flavor and juices of a quality piece of meat. It works with other cuts, such as rib eye and New York steaks, too. Anything other than medium rare would be sacrilege. As with any recipe, try cooking it at least once at home before serving it for company.
“Soup” for Winter Angling
By Bud Bynack
“Soup” can mean a lot of different things. The Chinese make “soup of the gods” with just boiling water, soy sauce, and some chopped green onion. There are silken purées from French haute cuisine and hearty stews of lentils and sausage from more northern climates. It’s actually pretty hard to put together a soup that doesn’t at least do the basic job of tasting good and fueling the body.
Those two criteria take on a special meaning when you’ve been wading a steelhead river in the winter. I’ve long been making a soup that’s a prime candidate for carrying in a thermos or heating up back at the motel when the weather’s cold, the rivers are the shade of green that says “steelhead,” and you need something tasty to warm you up after fishing down a long run.
It’s sort of Italianate, although not Italian. Neither the ingredients nor their quantities are sacrosanct in this recipe. But however you change things up, this makes a tasty and satisfying one-pot meal. I just call it “soup.”
“Soup”
Olive oil
A sprinkling of crushed red pepper
About 1/4 to 1/3 pound pancetta, chopped, not too finely
3 medium onions, chopped
2 large bell peppers (or other peppers), chopped
Garlic, finely chopped — I use a whole head; it becomes mild in the stock
1 large russet potato, in smallish cubes
2 zucchinis, in quarters or diced (or other vegetable)
1 small head of cabbage, diced, or other greens — chopped Swiss chard leaves are great
1 15-ounce can diced fire-roasted tomatoes
2 19-ounce cans of cannellini beans, partially drained (or garbanzos)
2 32-ounce boxes of low-sodium chicken stock
Oregano, a bay leaf, and/or other herbs
Salt and pepper
Start with a large pot with a heavy bottom. I use a 5-quart Dutch oven, and it gets filled up. Film the bottom with olive oil, add some crushed red pepper, let it toast a bit, then add the pancetta. It’ll more or less disappear into the soup, and vegetarians can leave it out, but its taste sort of haunts the final dish. (You could also use Italian sausage, but it results in a coarser-tasting soup.) Stir occasionally, and when the sizzle begins to subside, add the chopped onions, peppers, and garlic. Stir and let the whole thing cook down, then add the potato and zucchinis. Stir, cook a bit, and add the cabbage or other greens. This will seem almost to fill the pot, especially if you use chard, but it’ll cook down. Stir several times uncovered, cover, and let that happen, stirring again from time to time. Then uncover and add the tomatoes and their juice, the beans, partially drained, and enough chicken stock to fill the pot and float the other ingredients. This usually takes one 32-ounce box of stock. I specify two, because these quantities make enough for multiple meals, and when the soup cools, it thickens, thanks to the potato starch and the dissolving zucchinis. Thinning it later makes it go even further. Add salt, a grinding of fresh black pepper, the bay leaf, and other herbs. I usually just go with a considerable amount of dried oregano. Fresh basil is nice, too. Let the whole thing simmer uncovered for at least half an hour, until the potato and the cabbage or other greens are soft.
If you’re going to be carrying this ladled into a thermos, take along a Ziploc bag with some grated Parmesan, as well. Or at table, serve over bread fried in olive oil and rubbed with half a clove or raw garlic, with freshly grated Parmesan on top. It’s “soup.”
