Well, I became so involved in the flatiron steaks that I forgot to take pictures. No matter; I am going to repeat the process and this time it will be easy to be more deliberate and get the documentary work done.
Some plusses and deltas for the first transglutaminase experiment:
Plusses:
1) Wearing latex gloves — good idea. It might be overkill, but you may want to wear a mask also. I know, you say “I’ll never breathe it in”; however, I have heard some folks say the same thing about the utility of seat belts.
2) Working with fresh ingredients — it seems to me that one of the main virtues of a piece of meat as opposed to ground or chopped meat, be it ground beef or tartare, is this: the more surface area you expose, the more opportunities there are for microbial growth. When you cut a piece of meat apart and restructure it, the possible places that bacteria could grow increase.
Deltas:
1) Take pictures this time — while the process isn’t as interesting as one might hope for (frankly, it is a whole lot like dredging), it is still helpful to see how someone else does something. It gives a great edge in mental preparations.
2) Get adequate coverage — where I was simply reassembling slices of flatiron steak along one plane (such as the bottom of one slice and the top of another), my results were great. When I assembled a number of pieces, it seemed I hadn’t adequately covered the meat. The bottom was sealed, but the sides were not.
3) More pressure — cans in the fridge aren’t enough. For my first batch, I followed this process: After applying transglutaminase (Activa), I wrapped the meat tightly in saran wrap and then under a pan weighted down by cans. I think the future best practice would be to place reassembled product in a vacuum bag. This would be an easy way of getting the compression to support the bonding.
End result? I grilled two reassembled flatirons tonight, plus a small roulade piece left over from trimming. The verdict? Delicious. The lovely and talented C was my objective judge (she would not hesitate to say “funky” and not eat something). We found the steaks to have a great, gristle-free texture and wonderfully “beefy” taste. Delightful.
So, hold me to this: I will have the entire process documented and photographed within a few days.
You must log in to post a comment.