Your House. Steakhouse.

Ever make a pan-seared steak at home only to turn out gray? It probably ends up being ok, but nothing like a steak at a restaurant where the outside is brown and caramelized. Well, try dry-aging in your fridge. “But isn’t that hard and takes forever?” No.

I was inspired by Jonah Reider — the guy in NYC you have probably heard about that started a high-end restaurant in his college dorm. He is an ongoing source of ideas and a good follow on IG @jonahreider.

The reason your steak can turn gray is because it has a lot of moisture and kind of steams itself if you don’t have the heat high enough, no oil or fat or even crowd the pan. What dry-aging in the fridge will do is remove a lot of the moisture and promote a great crust. Having the cold, circulating air in the fridge also helps tenderize the meat and concentrates the flavors. It makes not getting a sear, pretty hard to do. 

So we are talking about taking out moisture — what else does that? Salt. There are a bunch of ways you can do that, including just putting salt on all sides of the meat. But what I like (and if you have read my previous blogs) is...you guessed it — fish sauce. Put fish sauce in a small bowl and generously brush it on all sides of the meat. For this post, I got a strip steak. But this can work on any steak and also can help improve your cheaper cuts of meat, making them more tender and delicious.

You can age it for as little as a day and that will get some of the moisture out, but I usually do 2-3 days. So on Wednesday, prep it that day and get ready for a great piece of steak for your Friday night dinner (maybe along with my LINK rum old-fashioned).

Ok, so here is what you will need: a quarter sheet pan, wire rack (same size) and a cast iron skillet. Brush all sides with the fish sauce and then put on the wire rack that is sitting on the pan  and then into your fridge, uncovered, as close to the fan as you can so that the meat gets a lot of air circulation. 

Day 1 in the fridge

Day 3 in the fridge

When you are ready to cook, remove the steak and temper it for about 20-30 minutes out of the fridge so it cooks evenly. Then from here you can cook it any way you like. Remember, if you used fish sauce, you don’t need to season with salt — fish sauce is salt. Just use pepper. You can season with flaky Maldon finishing salt before you eat. Just whatever you do, for the love, don’t use Morton iodized salt.

Now, to see what I did with the steak, go to this recipe and find out more.