/ck/ - Food & Cooking

[Anonymous No.19150055]

How the FUCK do I get colour on a fucking steak? Every time I try to cook one it ALWAYS turns out grey with only the edges getting some colour. I make sure they're dry before hand hand have my pan hot. Some times I'll leave my pan on for 5 minutes to get it hotter, yet it's always fucking grey. WHAT AM I DOING WROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNNNNNNNNGGGGGGG?????????

[Anonymous No.19150060]

pan's not hot

[Anonymous No.19150065]

>>19150055
More oil

[Anonymous No.19150066]

>>19150060
Do I have to almost burn my house down to make sure the pan it hot enough? I'll wait till I can see it literally smoking

[Anonymous No.19150068]

pat it dry first or put it in the fridge on a rack to dry the outside

My boomer dad has the same complaint and he doused every steak in soy soy sauce before grilling it

[Anonymous No.19150070]

>>19150068
I do that. I dry it an hour before cooking and let it come up to room temp

[Anonymous No.19150071]

>>19150066
literally as hot as you can get it. and oil the meat, not the pan. the end.

[Anonymous No.19150072]

>>19150066
Are you using butter? Butter smoking is the residual milk solids burning, not the fat smoking. And some inappropriate oils like olive start smoking when they're not as hot as you need.

[Anonymous No.19150076]

>>19150071
Might just get a whole new stove.
>>19150072
No I'm using peanut oil and butter the baste

[Anonymous No.19150080]

bet op is jiggling his steak and checking the underside the whole time like an impatient retard

[Anonymous No.19150083]

>>19150080
No I leave it there for 2 minutes before flipping

[Anonymous No.19150117]

>>19150083
you definitely need more fats in the pan

salt the shit out of them at least a half hour before you cook them, contrary to popular belief this is not so that the seasoning penetrates into the beef, but rather to draw the moisture out of the surface. less moisture = more crispy

for an even cook you want to flip frequently, every 30-45 seconds is fine as long as you are on a very high heat. Longer sitting times = higher heat exposure to the interior. The heat should come to the protein as a sort of 'shock'

use a proper pan too

with that being said, leaner cuts of meat will not form a crust, it will only colour over.

t. cooks and eats steak 5 nights a week

[Anonymous No.19150124]

Hand torch

[Anonymous No.19150127]

>>19150055
salt it and put it on a wire rack uncovered in the fridge the night before (or more), it'll feel sorta leathery but when cooked in a very hot cast iron pan the whole thing will become crust while remaining tender inside

[Anonymous No.19150128]

>>19150055
Post a picture of your pan.
The leaner the steak the harder it is to get a good sear.

[Anonymous No.19150133]

Getting a nice sear requires:
Enough Heat
Oil/Fat
Salt
No moisture on the meat
If any of those things are lacking you won't get a good result.

[Anonymous No.19150141]

>>19150128
This is the one
>>19150127
>>19150117
>>19150133
Guess all I can do is use this advice and try again

[Anonymous No.19150142]

this pan probably isn't thick enough to give you a proper crust>>19150141

[Anonymous No.19150147]

>>19150141
>nonstick pan
lmao

[Anonymous No.19150152]

>>19150142
>>19150147
what pan should I buy then?

[Anonymous No.19150155]

You don't need more fat. Excessive fat prevents searing.

You just need to get the pan hot as fuck and then, when you put in the steak (which has been out of the fridge for a while), do not move it. Resist the urge to turn, rotate, anything. Then you will get a good colour

[Anonymous No.19150159]

>>19150155
we call this the reddit sear

[Anonymous No.19150211]

>>19150152
12 or 10 inch stainless steel carbon steel or cast iron.

[Anonymous No.19150328]

>>19150055
>only edges getting color
The center is not making proper contact with the pan, due to it cupping up or excess liquid trapped underneath is forming a moisture shield. Giving the steak a little lift or added pressure will help, and place the meat in slowly from one end to the other, like you're rolling out a carpet.

[Anonymous No.19150339]

>>19150141
As another poster mentioned this isn't the appropriate pan to cook steak. Not only is it just worse at browning meat but non-stick pans aren't safe if heated too much.

Stainless steel or cast iron should do the trick. Keep that non-stick for things like eggs or fish though.

[Anonymous No.19150341]

>>19150055
A few notes since you're dumb as a brick:
Non-stick is not inherently conducive to getting a good sear, try a different pan
Too much oil will mean you're effectively frying your steak so you need "just enough" that will let your steak still be in contact with the pan
Remove as much moisture as possible from the surface of the steak by blotting with paper towels right before it goes into the pan
If the steak is thick flip frequently. If it's not, let it build up a crust on one side before flipping. Let it sit while doing it, and don't touch.

[Anonymous No.19150343]

>>19150339
this isn't true btw

[Anonymous No.19150354]

>>19150328
>>19150055
seconding this, try to press it down into the pan with a spatula
if you're a westerner i think they sell actual weights for cooking but i can't fucking get them in bulgaria unless i want to order from amazon and pay out the ass for delivery
personally i use spatula + my onyx mortar if i want to keep the pressure constant without having to be pressing on it constantly. but my mortar weighs like 3 kilos while these weights look much lighter than that so idk
and as others have said, the pan you're using really isn't the best for the job. but i think you'll get improvements if you just press the meat down. i've had problems with only edges getting color in my stainless steel pan too, before i started pressing

[Anonymous No.19150360]

Americans are retarded when it comes to cooking, youre proud that u made an home made meal its like daaah

[Anonymous No.19150362]

>>19150343
How is it not? Even the manufacturer recommends not heating your pan above 500f

[Anonymous No.19150365]

>>19150055
My trick is never washing my grill grates or cast iron pan.

[Anonymous No.19150381]

switch to cast iron

[Anonymous No.19150385]

>>19150343
yeah it is true. different anon btw

[Anonymous No.19150387]

>>19150117
>for an even cook you want to flip frequently

[Anonymous No.19150392]

>>19150076
>No I'm using peanut oil and butter the baste
Never going to get hot enough without starting a grease fire. Use avocado oil, or better yet, a backyard grill, not your stove.

[Anonymous No.19150404]

>>19150360
>Americans are retarded when it comes to cooking
No.
And oh yeah, we're the kings of steak.

[Anonymous No.19150448]

>>19150385
me again, i was just joking in this post, it isn't really true

[Anonymous No.19150474]

>>19150076
>>19150392
Anon, peanut oils smokes at 450, that's blenty hot to sear a steak.

OP, gray is stage before it browns nicely. The reason anons are telling you it's not hot enough, is because you didn't leave it to brown for enough time at temperature you made it at. The rarer you want it inside, the higher your sear temp needs to be. Also the thicker the steak the lower your sear temp should be. But not lower than let's say 350.

Make sure the steak is dry, pat it dry with a towel and then put a metric shit ton on oil on it.

Another color hack is to smoke sear it, so you get that pink smoke ring in the same time. Also because charcoal grilled steak is delicious.

[Anonymous No.19150476]

>>19150055
blowtorch

[Anonymous No.19150480]

>>19150474
>Anon, peanut oils smokes at 450, that's blenty hot to sear a steak
And butter smokes at 350. Try to keep up.

[Anonymous No.19150539]

>>19150480
>>19150392
>butter the baste
i think he means butter to baste. not to fry in. as in, he tosses some butter at the end, off the heat, just until it melts and then spoons it over the steak.

[Anonymous No.19150559]

>>19150539
He's having trouble with smoke without searing. I'm pretty sure the butter is his problem, no matter how you want to spin this.

[Anonymous No.19150718]

>>19150559
he could also be using shitty and/or thin cuts that curl up on the edges. the way he described it
>ALWAYS turns out grey with only the edges getting some colour
makes me think that might be the case too. something like this

[Anonymous No.19150731]

>>19150718
>>19150559
forgot to say, in this case pressing down should help, also trying other steak voodoo like cutting into the fat, only oiling the steak and not the pan, etc. i've seen people suggest many different solutions to this and according to the reddit thread i got this pic off of, he was using avocado oil, preheating the pan in an oven, using a temp gun, etc. and this still happened to him.
i've ran into a similar problem before and the only solution that worked for me was just pressing the meat down. but some other steak voodoo might work for anon, assuming this is the problem he was describing in his op
he can google "steak curling up" for a bunch of different solutions

[Anonymous No.19150751]

>>19150387
yes lmao, this is extremely important
the old myth that you should only flip a steak once is one of the easiest ways to fuck up the evenness of a steak

[Anonymous No.19150792]

>>19150751
Not him, but based on my personal experience, you're completely full of shit.
And its understandable. Flipping multiple times won't lead to any particular problem, but it also can't solve any particular problem.
You: "I have a stone in my pocket that protects me from tigers", me: "this is Delaware, there isn't a tiger within thousands of miles".
Congrats, you "solved" what was probably a fiction problem.

[Anonymous No.19150966]

>>19150055
I bet the marbling on that steak is amazing. The intramuscular fat is what melts down and creates flavour. Did you know you can tell the quality of a steak by its marbling?

[Anonymous No.19150985]

pan frying steak is a crime against humanity.
Anyone who disagees with me is wrong and should explore canadian euthanasia laws.