The manner you cook a steak is really flexible. Let’s examine the advantages and disadvantages of three of the most popular ones.
Is there a certain method for cooking a steak that is superior to all others? I try to provide an answer to that query both here and in the aforementioned video. Who doesn’t want to have a great life that is filled with quality and efficiency, after all? Everything I did, from keeping tomatoes (which is difficult) to cleaning my teeth (I’ve never had a cavity in my life, so I can’t be too far off), would be optimized for quality and simplicity if I had my way.Â
The Top 3 Steak Cooking Methods
The solution is this, as it is with many things in life: It varies. The ideal method for cooking steak depends on your preferences and the situation. Do you like a deeper, crustier sear on the exterior or a more evenly distributed gradient of doneness? Are you feeding a large group of people or simply one or two steaks? And how good a cook are you exactly? You will frequently arrive at a different steak-cooking conclusion based on the answers to these questions.
Let’s look more closely. Only a few prerequisites, though, before we move on. Due to the fact that grilling introduces a wider range of variables that are more difficult to analyze (for example, what kind of grill and fuel source do you use? ), I first decided to exclude grilling from this comparison and instead focus on “indoor” cooking techniques that involve finishing the steak on a stovetop. Yet, it’s important to remember that, unlike the butter-basting technique, both sous vide and the reverse-sear can be finished on the grill.
Sous vide
Sous vide lovers, brace yourselves because I won’t just call this recipe the winner at this point. The simplest, most reliable way for achieving the perfect steak doneness is sous vide. Adjust the temperature of the water, add the steaks to the bags, and then wait. There is practically no chance of overcooking, but steaks kept in a hot water bath for longer than four hours will start to display increasingly unfavorable textural changes. This makes sous vide a great option for those who wish to benefit from the most hands-off of all three techniques or who have less cooking experience. For me, that degree of comfort is especially tempting whether I’m preparing many steaks for a large group or simply socializing in general. Since the steaks are secure in their hot-water bath, I can relax with my guests without worrying. I only need a minute to give them a final sear when it’s time to eat, and then we’re set to go.
The steaks stay wet throughout the sous vide process because they are wrapped in a plastic bag. Water is the enemy of browning, thus this causes a problem when it’s time to sear. Sure, after removing them from the bag, you should dry them off with towels, but this won’t ever dehydrate the surface of the meat as effectively as the other techniques. This results in a decision: Accept a less-than-profound sear (the Maillard process, after all, accounts for much of the wonderful flavor of steak), or sear the steak more intensely and for a longer period of time, which would somewhat undermine the precise edge-to-edge doneness gradient that sous vide otherwise ensures.
reverse-sear
The reverse sear is the greatest method for cooking a steak, And It makes a pretty compelling case for that assertion. Definitely add a few qualifications. The reverse-sear is unquestionably the best way if we’re seeking for the “Goldilocks” approach—the one that perfectly balances all the factors that could be taken into account. The reverse-sear approach, which entails slowly cooking the steaks in a low oven until the required internal temperature is attained and then finishing in a hot skillet, yields the best results in terms of simplicity, maximum sear, and a uniform gradient of doneness. Overall, it’s the approach I would suggest the majority of the time to folks.
Advantages of Reverse Sewing The steaks are cooked using a reverse-sear technique, which starts them out at a low temperature, gradually raises it until the meat is cooked to the appropriate doneness, and then finishes with a sear on a hot skillet. It’s not as foolproof as sous vide because your oven is not as accurate as an immersion circulator or able to achieve the same low temperatures, so there is a minor possibility that you will accidently overcook the meat. Yet, it is still far more dependable than a high-heat approach like butter-basting because the meat cooks up gradually. It also delivers an impressively even inner gradient of doneness due to its low-and-slow approach. Also, the steaks’ surfaces dehydrate while cooking uncovered in the dry oven heat, which produces a much richer and tastier crust than sous vide when you do sear them.
Reverse-Sear Drawbacks: Although the reverse-sear technique is generally reliable, there is some risk involved. Steaks can be overcooked, and if a probe thermometer without an alert isn’t being used, the method’s general hands-off attitude may cause the cook to become a little bit too careless: You simply wasted your time and money if you get sidetracked and miss that exact moment of doneness. And while a steak with a reverse-sear crust is unquestionably excellent, it isn’t the best crust—unless, like with sous vide, you give up the steak’s more ideal interior doneness in favor of a deeper sear.
Butter-Basting
The traditional method of preparing a steak is to cook it entirely in a skillet while basting it with hot butter. But just because something is the original doesn’t mean it will win. You’ll discover that this strategy has advantages and disadvantages, just like the other two. Nonetheless, I won’t conceal my views (watch the video to see how I’m unable to do so): My personal fave is this. In comparison to the other two, butter-basting produces a deeper, more delicious sear and a crispier crust, and for those reasons I’m prepared to put up with a tiny band of surface grayness. I don’t expect everyone to agree with me—your priorities may probably be different.
Benefits of Butter-Basting: By cooking the steak for the entire time on a hot skillet, you maximize the amount of time it has to get that roasted exterior. It is the hottest, crispiest, and roastiest of all of them. The crunchy exterior and delicate interior will have the most flavor and textural contrast. As the steak browns and absorbs the flavors of the herbs and aromatics you’ve (ideally) added to the pan, it also spends the most time in a bath of progressively fragrant butter.
Disadvantages of Butter-Basting: This method has a few drawbacks. It’s the least foolproof, which is the first drawback. When the heat is high from the start, the steak cooks more quickly and there is a limited window of time to remove it from the skillet at the ideal time. It’s the most challenging of the three procedures to use for more than one or two servings. Although it takes the least amount of time to cook overall, it requires the most active cooking time, so you are tethered to your stove from the moment you start cooking until the moment you finish. Also, it always results in a steak with a more pronounced gradient of doneness, with a thin inner line of well-done flesh beneath the surface that changes to your preferred interior temperature as you approach the center. It’s not a major concern to me because I find this band to be minor when butter-basting is done correctly, but others could discover that they just cannot tolerate anything other than the nearly complete lack of a gradient that sous vide or the reverse-sear give.
As a result, as you can see, there is no one correct response. What is the best technique to cook a steak? The actual question is: How confident are you in the kitchen? How many customers do you have? Most importantly, how would you describe the ideal steak in your opinion?