Do you age your meat?

[mudbug]

Cape Chef's topic "Can you tell the Difference" inspired yet another tangent...

How many of you age your meats? We've been doing it at home according to "Cook's Illustrated" and find the flavor pleasantly "meatier" and more tender....

[momoreg]

That's funny... we we just discussing that yesterday at work. Nobody was really sure what the appropriate temperature is for that. We all tought somewhere around 40 degrees F. was about right.

[Live_to_cook]

Tried the Cook's Illustrated method with my standing rib roasts (beef prime rib with the rib bones still on). Basically you just leave it on a rack in a pan in the fridge with paper towels to soak up the drips.

Left them four days, trimmed the dried layer, used trimmings to make quick broth to beef up sauce. (Mmmmmmmm )

Definitely noted gain in tenderness. Don't eat this fine beef roast often, so unsure if flavor gain.

Meaning to try it on a 2" porterhouse next time.

[This message has been edited by Live_to_cook (edited 01-19-2001).]

Gotta bring the Farm Girl out in me on this one. Beef must age at least 14 days. Perhaps I'm reading this wrong, which is higly possible. But you really don't want to eat a steak that was just cut. Beef, in particular but not separate from chicken or other fowl, is not to be eaten immediately.

Understand that the term "the goose hangs high" comes from the fact that in the old days in Merrye Olde England that they used to hang fowl by the neck until it was "high", i.e. almost rotten. I bet it was real tender and had a lot of "flavor".

In Oaxaca Mexico they serve a cut of meat...can't remember now, I looked it up in a cookbook...maybe a skirt steak or something. But they slice it paper thin back and forth so that you get one long strip of meat, then they loop it around poles and age it until it gets "high." Then they lightly pan-fry it, I think. It was served for breakfast, and it was delicious. I ate it almost every day I was there. I'd love to try it, have seen directions in Marilyn Tausand's book, but haven't had the guts...I'm scarred from a childhood incident in which my parents tried to make corned beef and ended up with a maggot-ridden chunk of smelly beef which they threw off the bridge into the river, pan and all...kind of like a culinary Ode to Billy Joe...

Fling that sucker right off the Tallahatchie Bridge! See if those little maggot varmints can swim.

Think we had an earlier thread about gross things to eat.

I'm thinking about holding a striploin "VacPac" in the cooler for 15 days to see what it does.A few friends from CIA claim It
will help tenderize because of the enzimes breaking down something or other (I was trying to pay attention but I was working at the time).They told me not to open the "Pac"
but let it set 10-15 days to age it.Any thoughts?Bill Bill@pa.net

[cape chef]

Hi CWK,

I would caution against 15 days in a crayovac for meat, It sit's in it's own blood and will turn spoiled before anything else. I recommend taking it out of the crayo and placing on a cooling rack at 36 -38 degree's make sure their is good air circulation and everyday or so when you first start pat out the blood that settles in the pan. That will turn if not removed. After the meat has formed it's initial "crust" then you will not have to remove any more blood. aging meats to be effective needs good air flow it should not be sealed after fifteen days your meat will have a nice crust and maybe a slight order,but that is ok.You want to trim the entire 1 by 1 of all the crust until you see the red of the muscle. Cut a piece and just a little salt and pepper and grill it MR and smile
cc