Motivation to Have a Big-Ass Steak This Weekend
When I picked up my CSA package from the Marin Sun Farms drop-point on Wednesday (five minutes from my house), I noticed that there were two T-bone steaks included. And that they were massive. One clocked in at 1.2 and the other, a whopping 1.6 pounds, about 25.5 ounces. I might have put them in the box freezer and waited for the weekend to grill them, but the vacuum packing on one of them had been compromised. What to do?
What you do is grill them up as soon as possible; final and correct answer. Click on all for the larger, hi-res images.
T bones Resting
In the meantime, I set my hand to doing a perfectly emulsified (and that says emulsified) dijon vinaigrette for a green salad. I can’t give you quantities, but it’s whatever amount of extra virgin olive oil you’ll need to dress your whole salad, enough dijon mustard (Maille is the best, Grey Poupon is shit), some red wine vinegar and if you like a bit of red wine itself (this was the case here). I’ll just have to do a video showing how I do it, which is to gradually add a bit of mustard, a bit of vinegar, until it emulsifies.
Dijon Vinaigrette
And that will be going on this.
Green Salad
Which will be staying entirely out of the way of this, until invited.
Dinner is Served
I topped this one with some butter that I slightly browned & clarified, along with some garlic powder in it. Pro tip: once it was clarified and I’d let it sit a while I dipped my finger in to judge the taste of the garlic. Uh, oh: granules of undissolved powder. How to fix? It’s clarified already, no water left? Easy: just add in a couple tsps of water fire it up, boil off the water and no more granules.
All in all it was a fine steak, of which I devoured the entire 1.6 pounds. Well, save for the bone.
T-bone Carcass
Meanwhile, on the other end of the dietary spectrum…
Banana Carcass
Poor raw fuitarian vegans.
So are you fired up to grill a Big-Ass Steak this weekend, or are you gonna go bananas instead? Whichever it is, share it with your friends and followers.
WHAT IT'S ABOUT AND HOW IT WORKS
Free The Animal is an eclectic writing project about everything since November 2003. 23 years, 5,500 posts, 5 million words.
It's a paid membership blog. Most posts are free and public, but only paid members can comment. What determines whether it's free or paid is when I publish. Monday through Friday, free and public. Saturday and Sunday, for paid members. That's it. Membership info here.
You have just given me all the motivation I need to have a big steak this weekend! However, I’m not gonna wait! Heading to the store now!
RawAthleticWarrior, seems to be in the thrall of the Fruit-Cult.
Eating dead things can’t sustain us? Well then, there’s only one thing for it!
youtube.com/watch?v=LzJEGqek3TQ
Word.
I do believe the bison brisket in our freezer has a date with our smoker this weekend.
Still plenty of meat left on that bone…
I like the way they cut the T-Bone, they give you the whole thing. Supermarket t-bone steaks are usually cut with one side of the meat almost completely cut off. of course you pay by the pound. But when I order one in a restaurant I want the whole thing on both sides of the “T”. Looks delicious.
Lute,
That is the way t-bones come off the animal. Looks to me like has Richard has a porterhouse, not a t-bone. There are only 2 maybe 3 of those available per animal.
Now I will be impressed when Richard knocks back a double-porterhouse. :-)
I actually just ate I giant Flank Steak just a tad past rare. It was really, really good!
How serendipitous, just polished off a small 28 days aged Irish grass-fed striploin along with some potato gratin.
Three countries produce the best steaks in the world in my opinion, Argentina, South Africa and Ireland. Ireland also has the best potatoes IMO, so we win in a tiebreak.
“a bit of red win”
Win indeed!
That looks so delicious… definitely having steak tonight.
Someone needs to start a “damnyouspellcheck.com”
I hope you made stock out of that.
It’s perfect for that Monday back to work when you don’t want to cook. Crockpot BAM vegetables BAM easy.
Whoa, whoa, whoa. There’s still plenty of meat on that bone. Now you take this home, throw it in a pot, add some broth, a potato. Baby, you’ve got a stew going.
Lot of meat is correct. But bring that bone to my house and I will show how to eat it until its smooth as a baby’s bottom. Stew? Bah! Humbug!
That looks pretty damn tasty. Just out of curiosity, since you are a fellow lean gains practitioner, how do you estimate your calories for the day with the mammoth grass fed beef? I have not seen much data on grass fed macros.
Rob:
Owing to neck & shoulder pain since the holidays (I’ve posted about it) I have not been following leangains, nor have I been doing anything but light workouts (except for leg presses). So, I pretty much eat ad libitum, but I do go 13-16 hours each day between my last meal of the day and my first of the next. I seem to holding onto my body comp.
“Poor raw fuitarian vegans.” …LOL…Instigator!
You know on some vegan forum somewhere just the opposite is posted.
Just out of curisoity I looked it up theres recipes for frying up some banana slices with bacon fat. That looks like a happy medium between frutarian and paleo :)
Yuck! Fried bananas.
Maybe there was a mistake in those recipes? Nnot bananas, but plantains. Fried plantains (which look like bananas) is a common dish in Caribbean cuisine.
Apparently bananas would just go mushy. Need to use plantains. Kim Lyons just posted a video showing how to make plantain chips. I’ve never made anything with plantain or bananas.
Seeing that awesome looking steak reminds me of this T-Shirt:
I should wear this into a local health food place I shop at while I’m packing open carry. See how many of the rail-thin, pasty, pale vegetarians faint on the spot.
I think I’m going to go throw about 6 pounds of roast in the slow cooker now. I’ll fire up the BBQ tomorrow.
@John and @Richard, have you tried filtered bacon drippings in place of butter? I’m allergic to dairy, so I’ve had to get creative. I run bacon drippings (I broil my bacon) through a filter.
Sometime I brush the grease into cast-iron which I preheat for about 20 minutes under a broiler and also onto the steaks, sear for about a minute on each side. I set the steak aside and let the skillet cool for a minute, then throw about 1/4 cup of merlot, 1/4 cup of water, and a tbsp of minced or crushed garlic in the pan, put a lid on immediately, and leave it for another two minutes to reduce. Coat the steak in the reduced wine, put it back under the broiler for 2-3 minutes, turning once.
I use bacon dripping from time to time, always have. I don’t strain, though. Just pour into a cup, let it settle, then harden in the fridge. The stuff on top is clear.
I have a 4lb slab of ribeye in my fridge. Not grass fed, but I will be cutting them into 1″ thick steaks. Yes, I am inspired!!! Oh, fuck all you vegetarian fucktards by the way.
Great idea, Edwin! Frying banana in bacon fat.
I like the idea of clarifying the butter and drizzling it over the steak. But, I’m wondering what happened to the banana that was in that peel? :)
By the way, I found this little gem:
This guy’s logic is unbelievably faulty.
Steak is our regular Saturday night dinner, with reduction sauce, of course.
you live in California right? You better stay indoors this weekend cause that radiation is coming your way. I’d be careful about going outdoors and enjoying the rain. The government says the radiation is minor because they have to in order to minimize the possible panic, not because it’s necessarily true. You can’t trust the scumbags.
Not this shit again.
Might want to add: Don’t trust random internet idiots.
and: the supermoon is the end of the world!1111!!!11
xkcd.com/radiation/
I think tonight’s dinner is going to look a lot like that, except my salad will be frisee aux lardons (for you philistines, that’s frisee lettuce with white wine vinaigrette and hunks of amazing local bacon).
Richard, do you butter your steaks? I’m guessing that you do from the look of that plate. I put a lump of compound butter on top right as it comes off the grill, and let it stand covered for 10 min or so before I eat. For those who don’t want to make compound butter themselves, try a thin slice of Kerrygold herbed butter together with a slice of your favorite regular butter, works just fine.
John, you must have missed it in the post but year, clarified garlic butter.
Motivation to have a big ass steak? Richard, you’re losing your edge. Incredible meat like that needs no motivation. In fact I’d need a motivation NOT to lay into those beauties forthwith. Great food porn as always. Thanks much.
“Maille is the best, Grey Poupon is shit”
Interesting. I’ve never thought much of Grey Poupon either, but it never occurred to me to try another brand. I’ll give it a shot.
Grey Poupon was probably decent back when it was made in France in the traditional ways.
Now it’s owned by Kraft.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grey_Poupon
TWO big ass steaks for me, thank you very much.
Bananas? Fuck that shit.
When you said “Motivation to Have a Big-Ass Steak This Weekend” I thought you were going to post about the vegan sponsored Great American Meat Out, which is March 20! Now that’s extra motivation to enjoy a steak!
Sure is. Hell, that’s justification enough to go have some cheat in the form of a big-ass burger at a fast food joint if you can’t do better on short notice.
*mega-like!*
Awesome steaks man! I would have both the steak and the bananas for dessert. Ha!
I would like to see your line on vegetables to become part of the official dietary guidelines.
“Vegetables shall stay entirely out of the way of meat until damn well invited.”
I am reading this at 8 AM. My first meal is still 4 hours off. Damn you, Richard. Damn you.
[…] See the rest here: Motivation to Have a Big-Ass Steak This Weekend | Free The Animal […]
HAHA! Love it. Dreaming of steak now, here at work. Gonna have to fire up the grill soon!
[…] red meats are sweetest. Richard Nikoley would […]