A Pair of Steaks

Sunday night was steak night at our house, and I decided to go with an old favorite and a new experiment. On the right, Jenn was served as silly-sized black angus ribeye, supposedly from a noted black angus farm, cooked a blissful medium rare. We are big ribeye fans in our house, as we generally agree the ribeye is the most flavorful steak in the steer, with its marbling and tenderness.

Although I rarely cook the cut, I coated a Flintstones-sized porterhouse with chimichurri and grilled it. As always, it re-affirmed my belief that the porterhouse is far from “king of the steaks,” largely because as good as the filet can be – as tender and juicy as possible – the strip is never as good as I imagine it could be under other circumstances.

I consider myself pretty particular when it comes to beef, and I believe that short of preparing it over wood smoke on some 1100 degree grill, I don’t think the strip can be prepared to taste as good as several other steaks. Like many cuts of sirloin, it really requires marinade or a rub of some sort to bring out any powerful flavor, and with some sort of aid, it’s usually not natural steak flavor. In general, if a steak can’t be seasoned with just extra virgin olive oil, kosher salt, and pepper, it’s a second class steak in our house. That doesn’t mean we won’t eat it, it’s just second tier. Nonetheless, it was plenty tasty enough to accompany the meal.

Lightly sauteed asparagus, tri-color cous cous, and fresh pretzel bread accompanied the steaks and rounded out a great meal.


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