Steak for Two

"You are What you Eat" has long been a contention among some students of gastronomy.

Romans believed that one who favored rabbit stew would become timid. A man, on the other hand, who chewed tough lion meat bought from the butcher shop outside the amphitheatre would develop a stiff upper colon and be brave. In Sparta during the Fourth Century, if you were male and over twenty years of age, you were required by law to eat two pounds of meat a day. It was supposed to make you brave. Meat eating Tartars were known for their warlike activities while vegetable eating Brahmans were peaceable. As late as the Nineteenth Century some scientists were developing the hypothesis that if you ate fish, you'd be brainy because fish contained phosophorus and phosophorus was present in the human brain.

The argument has see-sawed back and forth for centuries with some sociologists arguing that food habits set our cultural pattern and shape our emotions while nutritionists argue that there is no laboratory basis for the claim. The sociologists present an intriguing theory which Playboy hates to kill, but it can be demolished by one word: steak.

Certainly it's true that you'll always find hefty bruisers bolting steak in such eateries as Gallagher's and Toots Shor's, and that leathery old cowhands out west demand steak for breakfast, dinner and supper. But beefsteak is also eaten in incredible quantities by sweet young Susies and nagging old squaws, by young-male squirts and elderly Lotharios, by frog-eating Frenchmen and kraut-chewing Germans, by brats, broads and bachelors alike. Everybody loves and devours the pièce de résistance from the thick side of a steer. Everybody gourmandizes on the charcoal-burned-outside, blushing-red-inside masterpiece of American cookery. Even Charles Dickens who vilified American manners and customs couldn't help but express his passionate enjoyment of American porterhouse steak.

A steak eater can find no actual words to describe his animal delight. When a man eats fried chicken, he can stop between the second joint and the thigh to exclaim, "Superb!" When he sits down to a platter of corned beef, there is an interlude while the cabbage is still protruding from his front teeth during which he can utter, "Delicious!" But a beefsteak eater is a silent man. A steak is no more conducive to conversation than the act of love. A man carves the oozing broiled club steak; with his fork he plays with it for a second in the drippings on the platter; he lifts the thick crimson slice to his lips. He may be able to utter, "Mmmmm!" or perhaps such variants as "Hmmmm!" or "Ummmm!" but he can't talk.

While both sexes eat T-bone constantly, the cooking of steak, it seems, has always been primarily a male art. A woman may make the best patty of chicken in the world, but it takes a man to place a thick shell steak over a bed of live ashen white charcoal. Something in a man's genes makes it easy for him to learn just when to turn the steak, how to season it, how to brush it with butter and how to carve it. For men who would like to develop the aggressive art of steak cookery, Playboy is happy to offer a few instructive details.

The first thing to learn about steaks is that there's no such thing as a thin steak. The word steak means a thick cut of food, and it can include anything from an eggplant steak to a salmon steak. But beefsteak must be cut at least an inch thick if it's to be broiled over or under the flames. If it is thinner than this, the heat of the broiler penetrates the inside of the meat before the outside is browned. The inside then becomes well-done, the rivulets of juice seep out, and the flavor is flat and steamy. Even a first rate minute steak which is quickly seared in a frying pan should be no less than a half inch thick, or it will be overdone, gray inside and insipid in flavor. As a matter of fact, the best broiled beefsteaks are anywhere from two inches to six inches in thickness. Big steaks of the latter size, served at banquets or beefsteak parties, are quickly seared on the outside under a fierce broiler flame and then transferred to the oven for twenty or thirty minutes where the heat completes the interior cooking.

The well-done steak, too, has always aroused Playboy's masculine protest. A well-done steak is like an apple pie without the apples or an orange with all the juice squeezed out of it. The genuine intrinsic beefsteak flavor, the red rivulets of goodness as well as the nutrients have flown out of the steak when it is cooked to the well-done stage. A beefsteak must be rare or medium rare. Any other steak is a perversion. If you like beef well-done, you should order boiled beef with horse-radish or sauerbraten or pot roast. But you shouldn't darken the door of a respectable steak house asking for a well-done steak.

A fresh beefsteak is a blunder. When you buy fish or seafood or vegetables, you want them as fresh as possible. The best steaks, however, are cut from loins of beef that have been aged. This simply means that after a steer has been slaughtered, the loins are placed in coolers with temperatures somewhat higher than normal refrigeration. Aging of meat is one of the fine arts. You can't do it in your home refrigerator. To age beef properly, air circulation must be maintained constantly and humidity must be controlled. Aging is continued anywhere from two to eight weeks. During this time the enzymes in the beef act on the meat tissue to tenderize it as well as develop its flavor. Beef shrinks somewhat during aging. This causes the price per pound to rise above that of fresh beef.

Because of the expense of aging, it's not easy to buy thoroughly aged beef at the corner butcher shop. But the hotels, clubs and fine steak houses have always insisted upon buying aged beef for steaks. In large cities, sometimes, it's possible to find a retail butcher who handles blue ribbon meat which has been aged. Certainly when you buy steak for a special bull session or for a mixed al fresco party, it's worth while to pay the added cost of aged prime beef.

How does a man know if a raw steak is good? The easiest way is to go to a reputable meat house -- some of them, like Wertheimers's in New York, have specialized in steaks for years -- and ask for their best cuts. Another guide is the stamp of the U.S. Department of Agriculture indicating the grade of beef. The best is stamped "Prime," the next best "Choice" and the third quality is called "Good." Other grades such as "Commercial" or "Utility" do not belong in a civilized kitchen. Not all meat, however, is graded by the federal government. Some of the big packers like Swift and Armour have their own grade terms comparable to the federal classifications indicating the best, next best, etc.

Professional beef buyers are guided by the following clues. The best beef is well fed and, therefore, has a thick layer of fat. The fat is creamy white and brittle. The meat itself has good conformation; that is, it is rounded, plumpish and fully developed rather than shrunken and wasty looking. The color of the beef may vary according to the kind of animal that was slaughtered. Generally, however, the best beef is cherry red rather than dark brick red in color. The bone should be pinkish and porous, indicating that the animal was young and tender. When you rub your fingers over the raw meat, it should have a smooth, silky feeling rather than a loose, coarse grain. Finally, the best steaks are well marbled; that is, the lean part of the meat contains many tiny small specks of white indicating top quality. Most of the beef in the United States is raised on Western grasslands. (concluded on page 28) Steak for Two (continued from page 21) Before the animals are sent to the slaughterhouses, they are kept in finishing pens and fed on a corn protein diet. This develops the fine flavor indicated by extensive marbling.

Many chefs and hotel butchers still use an extremely simple method of telling the tenderness of steak. They hold a piece of steak in their hands with the thumb on one side and forefinger on the other. Then they press the fingers together. If the fingertips meet easily, that is if the meat in its raw state is soft enough to be broken, it will be just as amendable to the knife and fork after it is cooked. (You cannot test veal or lamb in the same manner.) Naturally, a retail butcher will not permit you to manhandle steak in this manner in his butcher shop. But the test is still a valid one, and in the privacy of your own kitchen you may test beefsteak in this way.

What are the various cuts of beefsteak called? The jargon of the meat shop is enough to stump any sane man when he hears butchers and chefs talking about their loins, short loins and top sirloins, their short hips, ribs and shells, their chucks, sides and hind-quarters. One single kind of steak, for instance, is called filet mignon, tenderloin and chateaubriand. Each is taken from the same cut of beef. Playboy doesn't wish to add to the choctaw, so we'll just give you a quick rundown of the steak nomenclature commonly used in butcher shops and restaurants throughout the United States:

First of all, there is the porterhouse steak. It was named after old American inns where porter rather than ale was the specialty of the house. At the top of the porterhouse steak there is a small coarse grained piece called the flank or tail. It should be ground for hamburger rather than used for broiling. The porterhouse is divided by a bone into two main sections. The smaller section is called the tenderloin or filet mignon and is the tenderest cut of the entire beef carcass. More flavorful than the filet mignon and more firm in texture is the larger section of the porterhouse. The larger section when served without the filet is called a boneless loin steak, shell steak or strip steak. It is the specialty of most of the famous U.S. steak houses. A small porterhouse steak is called a T-Bone steak. As it becomes still smaller at the end of the loin and there is practically no filet left, it is called a club steak. A rib steak is similar to the club steak in appearance since it is cut from the rib section of beef right alongside the club steaks. The rib steak, while flavorful, tends to be loose in texture. Sirloin steaks are less tender than porterhouse but just as flavorful. From the smaller section of the sirloin comes the pin-bone sirloin, while a steak from the larger section is identified as wedge-bone.

When buying steaks, you should allow about eight ounces per person for a filet mignon. Any other steak should be from twelve ounces to one pound for a mansize portion. This weight allowance includes fat and bone.

The cooking time for steaks will vary, depending on the intensity of the flame, the distance the meat is placed from the flame, as well as the thickness and quality of the meat. If the meat is extremely cold when placed on the broiler rack or over the charcoal, it will naturally take a longer time to cook than if the meat is at room temperature. Experienced steak veterans always use a strong flame and a high temperature rather than a moderate flame. The strong heat quickly sears the meat and gives it its magnificent crisp brown crust. If you are using a gas broiler and you can set the thermostat, you should broil the steaks at 550 degrees. Preheat the broiler at least 10 minutes before putting the steaks under the fire. If you are cooking the steaks over an outdoor charcoal fire, there should be a uniform thick live bed of charcoals with white ash showing, and the steaks should be about five inches above the flame.

For broiling rare 1-inch steaks which are at room temperature, such as rib, club, sirloin, T-bone and porterhouse, allow about four to five minutes cooking time for each side. To make the 1-inch steaks medium rare, allow about one minute more on each side. To broil 1 1/2-inch steaks rare, allow six to seven minutes cooking time for each side and seven to eight minutes on each side for medium rare. A 2-inch steak will take eight to nine minutes on each side for cooking rare and ten to eleven minutes for cooking medium rare.

A 1-inch filet mignon will take three minutes on each side for cooking rare; a 1 1/2-inch filet mignon will require four to five minutes on each side and a 2-inch filet mignon will take six minutes on each side for rare broiling.

There are two ways of telling whether a steak is cooked sufficiently. A rare steak, when pressed quickly with the fingers or the back of a spoon, will feel somewhat resilient. It will yield to the pressure and bounce back. A medium rare steak will have less resiliency, while a well-done steak will feel firm to the touch. Since this touch method requires considerable experience, amateur chefs slit the meat in the very center with a small sharp knife. The place where the steak is slit will naturally produce a spurt of juice and lose some flavor. But if the cut is small, not too much goodness will be lost.

The following hints are important in the fine art of steak cookery. To keep the steak from curling as it broils, ask the butcher to slash the side of the meat in three or four places. To help sear the meat quickly brush it with salad oil or melted butter just before broiling. Sprinkle the steak rather liberally with salt and pepper just before broiling. To give the crust a deep brown color, sprinkle the meat lightly with paprika before broiling. When using a gas broiler flame, keep the broiler door open to check the browning of the steak. If one part of the steak turns brown faster than another, move the steak for uniform broiling. Use a pair of tongs rather than a meat fork for turning the steak. Don't cut a steak the instant it is removed from the broiler. Let it set for four or five minutes so that the flowing juices will be absorbed into the meat tissue. Use sharp steak knives, serrated or with straight edge, rather than ordinary table knives for cutting steak.

Most conservative beefeaters insist that beefsteak must be au naturel if its incredibly wonderful beef flavor is to be preserved. For the most part, this is true. Any man who splashes catsup or chili sauce or barbecue sauce over a fine broiled steak is dead to the finer things. But simple steak butters--largely derived from the French culinary art -- when combined with the juices of the meat on the platter, can make several heavenly varieties of natural gravy. Such butters are brushed or spread over the steaks after the cooking is completed. Some of them call for shallots -- a small yellow-skinned bulb of the onion family, not to be confused with spring onions. Shallots are available in fancy fruit and vegetable stores. Mild onion may be substituted for shallots if necessary.

[recipe_title]Maitre D'Hotel Butter[/recipe_title]

This is the best known of the steak butters. Let 1/2 cup of sweet or slightly salted butter stand at room temperature until soft but not melting. Add the juice of a half lemon and one tablespoon finely chopped parsley. Brush or spoon the butter over the steak on serving plates.

[recipe_title]Red Wine Steak Butter[/recipe_title]

On French menus this is listed as Marchand de Vin. Smack three medium size shallots with the flat side of a knife blade. This will loosen the skin. Remove the skin and chop the shallots as fine as possible. Place the shallots in a small saucepan with two tablespoons butter. Simmer until shallots are tender but not brown. Add 1/2 cup dry red wine. Continue cooking until the wine is reduced to 1/4 cup. Allow the shallots and wine to stand in the refrigerator until cold. Combine the shallots and wine with 1/4 cup softened butter. Mix well. Spoon or brush over steaks on serving plates.

[recipe_title]Marrow Butter[/recipe_title]

When you buy your steaks, ask the butcher to give you a small piece of beef marrow removed from the shin bone. Peel six shallots and chop very fine. Put the shallots and two tablespoons butter in a small saucepan. Cook slowly until the shallots are tender but not brown. Cut 1/4 cup of the marrow into small slices about 1/2-inch thick. Add the marrow to the saucepan and cook slowly until marrow melts. Remove from the flame. Add 1 tablespoon very finely chopped parsley, the juice of 1/4 lemon and 1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce. Spoon over steaks on serving plates.

playboy's food & drink editor