Frankly speaking, if the steak thickness is less than 1.5cm, it is actually more difficult to get a steak with both "gravy flavor" and "burnt flavor" because the window time for thin steak to cross from "tender" to "hard" is too short, which may not exceed 1 minute. Therefore, the thickness of the original cut steak had better be appropriate.
Generally speaking, the thickness of steak is positively correlated with the cross-section size, and the recommended thickness of steak with large cross-section (cold in the west and ribbed eyes) is 2.5 ~ 3cm；; The recommended thickness of steak with small cross section (filet mignon) is 3.5~4.5cm. The thick-cut steak has enough time to fry, so that the surface can be completely coked, and at the same time, the inside will not lose too much juice because the temperature rises too fast.
Steaks must be kept at room temperature before cooking.
After the steak is completely thawed, it must be placed at room temperature for 20~30 minutes before cooking. The reason is that too cold steak will consume the initial heat at the bottom of the pot and slow down the dehydration of the steak surface; At the same time, severe temperature difference will also make muscle fibers contract more violently and spill more juice, which is not conducive to the formation of "coking shell" The surface of the fried steak is gray like a cooked steak, and the meat taste and oily feeling will be greatly reduced.
The best thawing method of steak: tear open the vacuum packaging bag, wrap it with absorbent paper, and slowly thaw it in the air-cooled refrigerator. This method can retain the juice in steak cells to the greatest extent. Although it will take a long time (more than 12 hours), a good steak is worth waiting for. Of course, if time does not allow, it can also be thawed by soaking in cold water, but it is best to deflate the vacuum packaging bag properly, because the volume of the steak will increase after thawing, and it will be squeezed in the narrow space of vacuum packaging, and it will lose valuable juice like a towel.
3. The pot should be fully preheated.
Thick pot is the first choice for frying steak. There is a simple reason. The total heat required for baking a thick-bottomed pot is more than that required for baking a thin-bottomed pot. Similarly, after the steak is cooked, the cooling speed of the thin bottom pan will be faster than that of the thick bottom pan. From the point of view of heat conservation, the thick-bottomed pot has stronger "tolerance" ability in heat. Even if the gravy evaporates and absorbs heat, the bottom of the pot can maintain a relatively long high temperature, which makes use of the formation of the coking shell of steak. Because of the adjustment of firepower, the temperature change of the thick-bottomed pot is also moderate, which is also beneficial to the uniform heating of the steak.
If the pot is not fully preheated, the gravy spilled after cooking will slowly evaporate and gather around the steak, which is equivalent to "being stuffy in the broth", the frying time will be prolonged and the burnt taste will be discounted. How hot is the pot? It is generally necessary to reach the smoking point of oil, that is, to make the oil at the bottom of the pot start to smoke. It can be said that fully heating the pot is the most important step in frying steak. Steak can be seasoned with salt and black pepper before cooking, which also helps to form a coking shell on the surface. When one side of black pepper is burnt, it is the best time to turn down the fire.
Don't turn the steak over when it is cooked.
Don't turn the cow over after unloading it into a fully preheated pot. Take 3cm thick rib eye steak as an example. When the pepper is burnt, turn it down, and don't turn it over for at least 1.5~2 minutes, and don't turn it over when the sky collapses. Sirloin steak and rib eye steak are rich in oil, and a lot of oil will be dissolved in the process of frying and roasting, so there is no need to worry about burning. The purpose of not turning steak is not to affect the formation of coke shell on the surface of steak.
When the steak is nearly 70% ripe, there will be spots of red gravy on the surface, and it can be turned over after a while. Generally speaking, if the rib eye with a thickness of 3cm is to be medium-cooked, it needs to be fried for at least 3 minutes and turned once in the middle. Because the initial temperature of the second side of steak touching the bottom of the pot is not as high as that of the first side, the coking shell on the second side is far from perfect. In this regard, we can add a small piece of butter to help the second side of the steak turn over, and the melted butter can also be poured on the steak to increase the oily texture.
5. Sectional cooking is more suitable for thick steak.
If conditions permit, frying in a pan and oven can make a more perfect thick-cut steak. Frying steak allows heat to be directly transferred to the inside of the steak through hot metal. When the steak is baked at high temperature, it will quickly dehydrate and turn brown, giving off a burnt smell in just a few tens of seconds. But the disadvantage is obvious, it can only be heated on one side, so the internal heat shrinkage of steak is uneven, and the total heat absorbed by both sides is not equal.
At this time, we can use the oven to help. The oven is an indirect and uniform heating tool. The heat evenly heats the steak from all directions through air convection and infrared radiation of the box wall. Take a rib eye with a thickness of 3cm as an example. We can fry both sides for 3 minutes to fully coke the surface, and then bake in the oven 180℃ 10 minutes, or we can reach a state of five to seven ripeness, while retaining more gravy.
6. Fried steak must be kept upright.
The steak is finally fried, but don't eat it in a hurry. Fried steak needs to wake up for a while. In the process of frying steak, the temperature inside the steak has been rising, and the muscle fibers are in a high pressure state of continuous contraction and extrusion of gravy. If you cut the steak in a hurry when the internal temperature of the steak is the highest, the pressure that there is no place to put it will be released quickly, and as a result, a lot of valuable gravy will be lost.
What we need is to wait quietly, let the high-temperature steak cool down slowly, the muscle fibers relax slowly, and the enlarged intercellular space "absorbs" the gravy again. Usually, it is enough to wake up at the moment of entrance for 6~ 12 minutes. When you wake up, you need to keep warm. You can wrap the steak loosely in tin foil or let it stand in an oven at about 50℃. It is particularly important to note that it is best to hang the steak or put it on the grill after waking up, so that the dripping gravy will not soften the precious coking shell, which is the essence of the effort.