Mistakes To Avoid When Grilling Steak According To Chefs
It’s never too early to start prepping for barbecue seasonso go ahead and bookmark this.
Purists assert that a good-quality cut of steak is done ill justice at the hands of an overzealous grill. Contrast that to cheaper cuts like chuck roast, for example, which come to their prime slowly and forgivingly when slowly cooked. Cooking steak, therefore, is a paradoxically delicate matter for a powerfully primal affair. So its understandable that many diners and home cooks err on the side of overcooking it, especially if the quality of the meat might not be top shelf.
Regardless of what your preferences areand were not knocking any of emhere are eleven mistakes to avoid on your next steak night.
Grill Temp For Steak:
For the best results, preheat your grill to 500 degrees F if you use a gas grill. If youre using a charcoal grill, be sure the coals are much lighter in color before you start grilling.
The best way of achieving the perfect cook on a steak is to use a meat thermometer.
Because we grill at such a high temperature, it is best to use a Wireless Meat Thermometer once the steak has a nice sear on both sides.
This way, you dont ruin a thermometer , and you have an accurate read on your steak without having to constantly check it or lift up the grill lid.
Final Temperatures for Cooking Steak:
- Rare: 115-120 degrees F
- Medium Rare: 125-130 degrees F
- Medium: 135-140 degrees F
- Medium Well: 145-150 degrees F
- Well Done: 150-155 degrees F
My Method For Grilling New York Strip Steaks
Sometimes Im in the mood for a really simple steak. Today was a salt and pepper day. I simply sprinkled salt and pepper on both sides of my huge steak.
Use a good quality Kosher salt and a coarse ground pepper. none of that table salt for a beautiful steak like this.
Once my grill was heated to the appropriate temperature I added my steak over direct heat. Make sure you have a probe thermometer on hand to monitor the temperature of the steaks throughout the grilling process.
For more info on how to grill on charcoal checkout my post: How long to grill a steak on a charcoal grill The rule of threes
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How To Cook Ribeye Steak On The Grill
- Be sure your steak is completely thawed.
- Bring the meat to room temperature. Remove your steak from the refrigerator 30-40 minutes before cooking.
- Season steaks as desired we recommend Kansas City Steak Original Steak Seasoning.
- To cook on a charcoal grill, place steaks over the hottest part of the grill, and sear both sides for 1-2 minutes. Then move to medium, ash-covered coals and continue to grill for the times listed in the chart below. Turn about 1 minute prior to the halfway point.
- To cook on a gas grill, preheat on high. Sear both sides for 1-2 minutes, then reduce to medium heat and continue to grill for the times listed in the chart below. Turn about 1 minute prior to the halfway point.
- For the perfect medium-rare ribeye steak, grill for 9-12 minutes for a 1-inch steak, and 12-15 minutes for a 1½ inch steak, turning about 1 minute before the halfway point. A meat thermometer should read 130°F.
- Rest your steaks for 5 minutes before serving, covering lightly with foil. The temperature of the meat will continue to rise about 5°F during this time . The final temperature will read 135°F.
- Resting steak is also important because the heat of cooking pulls the juices in the meat toward the surface if you slice into it immediately after cooking, those flavorful juices will end up on your plate, not in your steak. Allowing your steak to rest will give the juices time to sink back in and throughout the meat, keeping it moist and flavorful.
Steak Fajitas With Grilled Bell Peppers And Portobello
Lets get grilling
Place KC Masterpiece® Garlic & Herb Marinade, cumin and lime juice in a large, resealable plastic bag. Add steak, mushrooms, peppers and onions and shake bag to coat ingredients. Refrigerate until ready to grill, up to 4 hours.
Prepare grill for medium-hot cooking. Drain marinade from bag and discard. Cook steak until browned on both sides, 5 minutes per side. Cook mushrooms, peppers and onion 4 minutes per side, or until lightly browned and softened. Slice steak and vegetables and keep warm.
Using tongs, heat tortillas quickly over grill. Fill warm tortillas with meat and vegetables, drizzle with Kingsford® Honey Jalapeno Mesquite Barbecue Sauce and serve with sour cream, lime wedges and cilantro as desired.
- green bell pepper seeded, quartered1
- yellow or red bell pepper seeded, quartered1
- Kingsford® Honey Jalapeno Mesquite Barbecue Sauce1/4cup
- KC Masterpiece® Garlic & Herb Marinade1/2cup
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Whats The Best Grill For Cooking Up Steaks
Ceramic grills, also known as kamado grills, feature an egg-shaped design and thicker walls that allow for more precise temperature control. With steaks, its all about regulating the temperature in order to ensure your steak is cooked to perfection. Your steak should be moist and tender on the inside and crisp on the outside. Many grilling enthusiasts can agree that using a ceramic grill is the easiest way to achieve the perfect steak.
How To Cook A Charcoal Steak
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Whenever you visit your local mega mart’s beef case you are confronted with a wide array of choices. Steaks have so many different names. It can be hard to keep them apart. My mission is to help sort out some of these names, one steak at a time. Up today is the charcoal steak.
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Fourth Position And Testing For Doneness
As you prepare to turn the steak for the last time, it’s time to start checking for doneness. The steak should show no red around the side and the top side should have a rich brown color. As you pick the steak up to rotate it 45 degrees , feel the density of the steak. A medium-rare steak should be firm but still have a good amount of give. Close the lid of the barbecue and continue grilling.
After this last position, turn down the heat on your grill and, if needed, test the temperature of the steak. The internal temperatures for different levels of doneness are:
- Rare: 120 to 130 F
- Medium Rare: 130 to 135 F
- Medium: 140 to 150 F
- Medium Well: 155 to 165 F
- Well: 170 F or higher
If your steak needs more cook time, leave it where it is and continue grilling on medium heat until done.
Best Charcoal Grills For Steaks Reviewed
Charcoal grills work well in grilling steaks. They make it easy to add wood flavor to food. I was searching for the best charcoal grill for steaks when I came across several brands of grills.
The process of locating the right grill can be challenging. I had to take a lot of time before finding the right products. As a way of trying to save you on time and cost, I have taken into consideration different factors to list for you the right products you can buy and never regret your decision.
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How Can You Tell If A Steak Is Medium Rare
How to Check Your Steaks Temperature Without a Thermometer Raw. Feel the palm of your hand, just below your thumb. Rare. Now bring your thumb to your pointer finger, and touch that same part of your palm again. Medium Rare. Touch your thumb to your middle finger. Medium. Move your thumb to your ring finger. Well- Done. Now touch your thumb to your pinky.
Serve Steaks Plain Or Dress Them Up
Each of these three cuts of beef is delicious grilled and served as is, along with a salad and something like baked potatoes or garlic bread. If youd like to enhance the meal, try pairing the steaks with the recipe I suggest for each cut: Roquefort butter for the grilled rib-eye, peppery Ancho chile harissa for the grilled porterhouse, or an Asian five-spice rub and sesame-soy sauce for the grilled flank steak.
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Grilling Tools For Beginners
As we mentioned earlier, grill grates are a great tool and one that will help you achieve a perfect sear. This grilling tool is made out of anodized aluminum and works to increase the surface temperature of the grill while also eliminating hot spots and reducing flare-ups. Its also rust resistant and just a great accessory to have if youre new to grilling and want to reduce the risk of burning your steak.
The Best Cuts For Grilling
First, let’s talk beef: rib-eye, strip and tenderloin are all great cuts for the grill. If you choose bone-in steaks, keep in mind that they take longer to cook. Look for good marbling to guarantee a juicy and tender cut. And ideally, steaks should be at 1 1/2 to 2 inches thick to form a nice charred crust without overcooking.
Flank, skirt and hanger steaks are also great on the grill. These thinner cuts are best marinated, grilled quickly over high heat and sliced against the grain to serve.
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Reverse Sear Ribeye Steak The Professional Way
- Preheat oven to 275°F. Place steaks on a wire rack over a baking sheet.
- Place baking sheet on the center rack of the hot oven. Cook until internal temperature reaches 10°F lower than the desired final temperature.
- Remove and let steaks rest for 5 minutes, covering lightly with foil.
- Preheat a heavy skillet or cast-iron skillet over high heat until very hot, about 5 minutes. A hot skillet delivers the best sear.
- Add some butter or oil and sear steaks for one minute each side. The final internal temperature of your steak should be 135°F for medium-rare and 145°F for medium.
- The sear will give your steaks the rich golden brown color and enhanced flavor that is typically associated with grilled steaks.
- Serve immediately. Unlike other methods of cooking steak, the low heat of the oven used in reverse searing does not draw the juices of the meat to the surface so additional resting time is not needed.
Do Weber Grills Ever Go On Sale
Select Weber grills go on sale in the Spring about every two years when new models are being introduced and Big Box stores need to clear out the older versions from inventory. You can find drastic price cuts on certain models but will need to search for them in person as they are not advertised online.
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How To Cook Ribeye Steak
How to cook steak depends very much upon the cut you choose. Ribeye steak is always a popular steak choice, prized for its tenderness and flavor. The best way to cook ribeye steak is on the grill. But pan-seared ribeye steak is also delicious, and you can broil ribeye steak in the oven as well. No matter which method you choose, our cooking instructions and video will deliver the tender and juicy steak you crave. Use a meat thermometer and you can be sure your steaks are cooked to perfection!
How To Light A Weber Gas Grill With A Match
The key point for you to consider is not to lean over your open Weber gas grill when you are trying to light it up with a match. Before doing anything check and confirm that all burner knobs are off by turning them counterclockwise. Now turn the supply of gas on and place your matchstick into its holder. Now strike to light it and take it past the grates as well as the Flavorizer Bars and ignite the grills burners one by one. In case if you have Summit or Genesis models from Weber then you need to light every burner individually in the same fashion. In case of the Spirit model, you can turn the 2nd and 3rd burner after you have lit the 1st one.
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How To Tell When The Steak Is Done
To tell if a steak is done, many chefs use the age-old trick of touching themselves . Understanding how different parts of your hand feels is an easy way to gauge the relative doneness of your steak. To do the hand trick, make an OK sign.
- Rare: Touch the pad at the base of your thumb. It should feel spongy with very little resistance.
- Medium Rare: Press your middle finger to your thumb and again touch the pad below your thumb. Search for the same sponginess.
- Medium Well: Press your ring finger to your thumb, then feel the area below your thumb.
- Well-Done: Press your pinky to your thumb. It should feel firm with no give.
The skin youve just been pressing gets progressively firmer with each finger tap. A medium steak would be between medium rare and medium well. If this step is too hard, feel free to use a thermometer
Dont Use The Wrong Kind Of Salt And When In Doubt Oversalt
True sea salt is always the way to go when seasoning a steak, Prentiss says. We use Jacobsen’s Kosher Salt from Portland, Oregon. The grains are medium sized and have a pleasant minerality that lends itself perfectly to grilled beef. Any true fleur de sel or sel gris type sea salt will work well for good beef. Avoid table salt, iodized salt or small fine-grain sea salts as they have more weight to volume than larger grain salts and you can easily over season with them. Just think medium grain, true sea salt.
Cervantez is a fan of kosher salt, which is, according to experts, virtually identical to sea salt. Cervantez is a fan of pepper, as well, and recommends combining both in equal quantities.
And when you do, Always overseason your steaks a bit, adds chef Christian Ragano. Hes the executive chef at Cindys, the rooftop restaurant at the Chicago Athletic Association. When you think it’s enough, always add a little more. A lot of salt and pepper always falls off during the cooking process and doesn’t always penetrate the meat.
Jayawardena of FireLake Grill House & Cocktail Bar in Bloomington, Minnesota, agrees. Now is not the time to be shy about seasoning, he says, adding that salt is the most important ingredient you could ever add to a steak. Do this before you let the steaks rest so the seasoning has time to work its way deep into the meat.
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Let The Steaks Rest And Serve
Once the steaks are up to the doneness you want, remove them from the grill and rest on a cutting board.
Letting them rest should take about 5 minutes.
Allowing the steaks to rest will cook further and raise the internal temperature to a few degrees.
This will also make the steaks juicier when you slice into them.
After letting them rest, slice the steaks and then serve them while hot!
How Long To Grill Steak
For a 1 1/2-inch thick steak, here are the general cooking times:
- 6 to 8 minutes for rare
- 7 to 10 minutes for medium-rare
- 10 to 12 minutes for medium
- 12 to 15 minutes for well done
Note that the USDA recommends cooking whole cuts of beef to an internal temperature of 145°F.
Keep in mind that the thickness of your steak, the heat of your grill, and your desired level of doneness will all impact the time it takes your steak to grill. Raichlen suggests checking the temperature of the steak by inserting a digital meat thermometer through the side, not top down. You can also use Elises handy dandy guide.
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Do You Close The Grill When Cooking Steak
Cooking steaks on a grill means that you need to make the cooking process faster.
Closing the grills lid when cooking steaks will help make sure that the grill maintains its temperature.
If you leave the lid open, the temperature around the steak will not be balanced causing cold spots around the grill.
It will slow down the cooking process as heat will not reach the inside of the steaks.
Closing the grill lid will allow the heat to go deeper into the meat and make sure that it cooks all the way through.
Dont Forget To Let The Steak Rest
Cooking the steak to ten degrees below your desired temp and then resting it allows for the collagen in the meat to thicken the juices as it cools slightly, says Prentiss. This creates a way juicier steak than just cooking straight to temp.
Sharp agrees. Let it rest. This is crucial, he says. Just because the steak is out of the pan doesnt mean it stopped cooking. Keep it in a warm placeyou don’t want a cold steakand rest it for about as long as you cooked it.
Chef Carlos recommends allowing the steak to rest for half the cooking time before servingso if your steak takes 10 minutes to cook, youd let it rest for five.
If youre not able to keep the steak warm while it rests, or you want to eat it quite hot, Prentiss recommends returning the steak to the grill after its rested and bringing it up to the internal temperature of your preference before eating.
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