British BBQ Society Forums

Dougieboy wrote:Ta everyone for the tips. I am on propane but think I will keep BBQ for sausages and research one of the charcoal ones you all mentioned. One final question as I now realise there is more to BBQ cooking than I thought, is a restaurant flavour steak achieved by high heat,cast iron grill or a lid keeping the fat smoke in ? Hopefully my next post will have good news.

There are quite a few ways to cook steak. The classic restaurant technique is to sear it in a cast iron or carbon steel frying pan (a cheap pan from Chinatown works best, not an expensive non-stick pan), as hot as it possibly can go, then cook it in an oven. Then wrap in foil and leave to rest on a hot plate for 5 minutes before eating.

Essentially there are two goals: browning the outside while not overcooking the centre. If the centre is cooked beyond medium-rare (about 55C) it's bad news.

For browning you want a temperature closer to 300C then 200C. If you can get up to this sort of temperature then you will get good brownness for sure. If it's a thin steak it will be cooked just from searing it, but a thick steak won't be cooked in the middle and this is where the oven comes in.

For bbqing over coals, you would create a hot zone underneath part of the grill with the charcoal piled up to create the highest possible temperature, and use it to sear the steak. Then when the steak is seared you would move it away from the direct heat, and at that point your BBQ is acting as an oven, to finish off the steak.

Some places now cook their steaks sous vide, basically the meat reaches the desired temperature of 55C in a water bath set at 55C over several hours, and then this is just finished off by searing on a hot grill when the order comes in.

Resting and high heat are the keys for me.

Cast iron retains heat and helps to give aesthetically pleasing grill marks.

I've tried sous vide with steaks twice, not sure i am going to continue to try ....! Both times i have been disappointed with the results in terms of the flavour compared with my normal method. But i would like to work out why... I am probably doing something wrong, but i don't know what currently.

Being a new owner of a cast iron grate, i think it does more than just give pleaseing grill marks. Due to the comparativly larger size of the cast iron bars, more of the steaks surface is charred and thus the seared flavour comes through more and alters the taste. Not saying either one is better or worse - just different. Kind of threw me the first time i tried a cast iron seared steak on my kamado and in retrospect this is what i think it is. I do however think the cast iron cooked steak is nearer to what you get in good restaurants.

I have a cast iron skillet which I use on top of my charcoal chimney for some serious searing of steaks. Then just chuck the lit coals into the kettle, steaks still in the pan, pan on the grate, lid on, few mins later steak for tea

Lee

Nice idea Lee, you can get very high temps with some gas grills the Outdoorchef is one of them. You invert the steel funnel to create a "volcano" appearance and effect, which funnels all that heat onto the bottom of the pan/griddle.
As to cast iron mankind has been cooking on cast iron far longr than with any other material, however IMO with the demise of the "Big Houses" stocked with servants, the homeowner wanted something lighter and "easier to use and clean" hence modern lightweight nonstick(ish) pans.
Good restaurants still have armies of sous-chefs & potboys to clean up after them. I will persevere with my ci griddle and doubtless will get it to work properly, and becopme easier to clean

Hi
I think you have 2 of the 3 inthe steak holy trinity, you are just missing the resting time. cast iron anything, if cooking indoors remove the batteries from youer smoke alarm. I know my pan is at the right temp when my wife starts asking "are you sure thats alright?"

its then sear for the griddle marks, double wrap in foil and keep somewhere warm for at least 5 mins probably 10 if it is a decent steak, and I guess that would be my final piece of advice, get your steak from a good butcher who can cut it the right thinkness from a well aged piece of meat. The skinny bright red shambles from most supermarkets are almost impossible to impart flavour to whatever grill based wizadry you apply.

Finally serve your steak with a big glass of wine!

Cheers
Tiny

Life is for the grilling........

To do the oven cook plus sear on a charcoal BBQ, i prefer to do the cook first and then sear to finish. Reason being that if you close down a charcoal bbq to finish you get loads of smoke from the lumpwood. But not good smoke and this can taint the food leaving too bitter a taste. So the steak gets cooked for a few minutes each side at a lower temperature (indirect if possible), then removed, grill up to temperature for a sear, then steak goes back on for the sear, then foil and rest. This method is known on some forums as the reverse TREx method.

Ta for all the advice, our local garden centre had 25% off everything today so I bought a weber one touch premium 57cm. Tried it out with some basic chicken,ribs etc and it all turned out great. Now bring on the steaks and the beer can chicken!