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Question For The Aging Experts

Gator Bait
Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
edited November -1 in EggHead Forum
 
Can I/should I dry age this roast? I know how great it will come out if I roast it as it is but I am curious if anyone has experience dry aging this cut.

DSC_0002_640.jpg
DSC_0004_640.jpg

Thanks in advance,

Gator

 
«1

Comments

  • Just my opinion...And I am NO expert!
    I haven’t aged anything at all, except leftovers in the fridge. wine, beer and smoked cheese :whistle: !
    I would lean VERY strongly toward doing a marinade for a day or a few, before ever thinking of doing an aging.
    Marinade, pickling, brining, curing...YES! But, the ageing process has just never been my thing :unsure: .
  • Grandpas Grub
    Grandpas Grub Posts: 14,226
     
    ummm, thought you had a question for the older folks.

    GG
  • Ragnar
    Ragnar Posts: 3
    Hi Gator, I was a meatcutter for almost 20 years (in another life) :) Anyway the dry ageing process needs to be carried out in a space that is very closely temperature AND humidity controlled. I can't recall ever seeing cuts like the top sirloin (pictured) or top round handled in this way. It is generally reserved for the loin and rib cuts (bone in). What happens it that the enzymes present in the meat begin to digest it, this results in a more tender product and also adds a distinctive flavor to the meat. If you happen to have a Whole Foods store in your area you might pay a visit to them, they sell steaks that are and are not dry aged, so you can try each type. The aged ones are quite a bit more expensive per pound as there is a considerable weight loss during the ageing process. I have no affiliation with Whole Foods.
  • emilluca
    emilluca Posts: 673
    This is best roasted at 375 rare and sliced very thin for beef sandwiches. Think of it as Arby style.
    There is 3 natural seams in the tip and if you follow them you can break this down into 3 smaller roast. Using the top picture turn it 180 degrees and you will see a seam that you can seperate off the tip along the bottom and up the side. You then have a piece that has another silver skin seam that you can follow to make two pieces.

    Certainly would make good ground round [very lean] patties. Not a good choice for stew.
    E
  • lowercasebill
    lowercasebill Posts: 5,218
    my vote is no. do to the shape i think you will end up with a ball o meat with a dried out crust around it, second,, in my limited experience , i think the loss of moisture from drying up is counter acted by the then higher percentage of fat which is why they age rib eyes and loins.. i suspect that hunk does not have enough fat and you will end up with jerky..
    if you are smart you will ignore my answer and wait for the 'all knowing one' [stripsteak] and follow his advice
    bill
  • wet age it. dry aging should be reserved for cuts that have a good layer of fat over as much of them as possible. rib subprimal or strip , for example. the fat slows things down.

    you will get the exact same enzyme flavors and muscle breakdown with wet aging as with dry aging (as far as our tongues can tell). you just do not get the extra benefit of condensing the beef through water loss. water is flavorless. when you lose 20% of the weight through water loss, the beef is that much beefier..

    that said, if you want to dry age it home, it is not dangerous. no more than driving a car is dangerous or storing other foods is dangerous. knowing what you are doing and why is everything.

    though large scale aging rooms are more humid, their are nothing complicated. dry aging is not complicated, even though it is complex ('complicated' and 'complex' are two unrelated things).

    your home fridge is entirely capable of holding temps, even with the door being opened and closed in daily use. humidity is not (NOT NOT NOT) required to be held within some mystic narrow band that only super high tech coolers can obtain. notice how no one ever says WHAT the humidity is?
    truth is. no one knows. it is preference, not science. a survey of commercial aging facilities (artisans, really) found a range of something like 55% to 85%. with every proprietor along the way beating his chest that his was the "correct" level of humidity.

    humidity is there (or absent) for one purpose: to control the rate at which the meat dries, so as to either hurry-up the weight-loss (speed condensing) or slow it down (to allow aging/enzyme action).

    humid environments allow a subprimal to age for the longest period, meaning you lose weight slowly, yielding meat that has allowed its enzymes maybe 45+ days to work, while the meat never gets too dry, still only losing about 20% of weight (all water).

    your home fridge, possible the driest environment, means you are pushin it at anything more than 21 days (very roughly) for strips, say 28 for rib subprimals. after that, you will have a lot of jerky around the edges. still edible. jerky is nothing more than dried meat which is flavored.

    in between those limits it is a decisions based on experience and preference.

    sorry to type this out. my hope is that some day, after typing this shizznit a hundred and fifty times, it will eventually turn the tide of naysayers who are quick to pooh-pooh, but slow to provide depth in their answer.

    a "yes" or "no" answer is useless and irresponsible in all cases, except when dealing with tipsy coeds or children with matches (respectively, of course).

    (pre-coffee, forgive ranting and misspellings)
  • your answer was far shorter than mine, and i said nothing that you hadn't already.

    i have a habit of using twenty words, when three will do. the joycean wannabe in me....
  • i should have been smart enough to say that i would just roast the thing as you mentioned. i wouldn't age it either way. ...though i really really wouldn't dry age it.
  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,663
    no (i like useless and irresponsible answers). if it were me i would half it and cook one side at 400 as a roast, the other side would get cooked at 275 for delibeef to be slced later.
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it
  • you gave a reason, which means it's not useless. heh heh heh

    just for the record, i answered his "CAN i age this" question. you answered the "SHOULD i age this" option ;)
  • Photo Egg
    Photo Egg Posts: 12,110
    How about a Dry Age, Wet Age Animated Video? LOL
    Darian
    Thank you,
    Darian

    Galveston Texas
  • i thought we had one?
    hahaha
    lemme check....
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Thanks Mr. & Mrs Potatohead, I suspect you may be right but have never heard of anyone aging this cut and thought it might be an inexpensive experiment. Not like a $100 subprimal. I have nothing to loose, I love it just roasted with any of the suggestions you make.

    Gator

     
  • Photo Egg
    Photo Egg Posts: 12,110
    I could have missed it. My bad. I know it would have to be broken down into several sections. Some of the posts in the past were full of great material.
    Darian
    Thank you,
    Darian

    Galveston Texas
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Morning Kent, if I have a question for the older folks I am surrounded by them on all corners down here. I get free advise all day long whether I want it or not. It's the price one pays for moving to Florida before retirment. :laugh:

    Gator

     
  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,663
    im still on the fence if it could be drybagged though, doesnt that bag kinda act like the fat with typical dryaging.
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Thanks for the advise Ragnar, I appreciate it. I have only seen the more expensive cuts dry aged and was curious.

    Gator

     
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Thanks emilluca

    I think you may be right. It's hard to go wrong with roasting it Arby's style but more rare and I can never have to much great roast beef.

    Gator

     
  • yeah, but it still dries....
    i think hungy-man dry-aged a tenderloin.

    just saying. anything can be done. but to do it just to do it without knowing why is a little odd to me. i mean, there's a reason you don't see dry aged tenderloin for sale usually. it can techincally be done, but the payoff isn't at all like the payoff for rib eye. and there's only so much room in the fridge.

    you can age a six-pack of coke along with your lafite, but why bother?

    i would just cook the damn thing. all my beef is "wet-aged", where wet aged means "left in the fridge forever with no concern for expiration dates. hahahaha
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Thanks bill, I have read on other sites that the fat is important and then many sites do not mention it. I think you are absolutely right. Thanks again.

    Gator

     
  • apologies to gator egg for completing the thread hi-jack...
    here's your requested video photoegg. never actually did an aging one. but here's a food poisoning themed one i found. took me forever to remember the website and my password

    >>> The Beef on Beef; Episode2



    .
  • Cpt'n Cook
    Cpt'n Cook Posts: 1,917
    I thought you were talking about Spring Chicken's question on the OT Forum :laugh:
  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,663
    well one reason the dryaging was done on fatty meats was because the fat slowed the dry process, a real reason you dont see it on cuts like tenderloin. just wonder if it would be beneficial with the drybag, never did see if he actually tried it on the tenderloin, i would have as i dont much like that cut anyways. the drybag just looks different with the finished products ive seen posted here, im not sure they taste the same without actually trying both pieces sidebyside
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it
  • i always try to mention the fat layer. and rrp and i have been talking forever off line about the dry age bags. i think early on folks were using them because they thought it was "safer", and i was pooh poohing that. but the more ron and i talked, i thought their benefit might be just that, that they act like fat. moreso because in a home fridge it's really the driest environment you'd want to try aging in, and the bags slow that down.
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Good Morning Oh Enlighten Carver of Pumpkins and Assorted Meats, your a braver man then I am. I can't look at the forum till after I have a cup of coffee in hand. ;)

    I am grateful for your input Jeff, I had never seen mention of aging this cut and could not recall any reasoning against it. I figured I had nothing to loose when I bought it, I cooked one a week ago and it was fantastic. I will wait and dry age a more appropriate cut, I can see where the fat would be important.

    I would guess from the sell by date (3/12/10) on this that it is very fresh, how long would you wet age this?

    Gator

     
  • RRP
    RRP Posts: 25,880
    from the whatever it's worth department...

    After the meat has been dry aged in a Drybag which was initially vacuumed down tightly against the meat it does become adhered to the meat like a skin. While it removes easily and in a solid piece I say you get about the same amount of resistance as peeling the back off contact paper.
    Re-gasketing America one yard at a time.
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Hahahaha, that thought came to mind but I thought I would cut Leroy, Kent and a few others here some slack. No one ever said the aging process was easy, I know, I'm working at it myself. :laugh:

    Gator

     
  • i'm not a master... hahaha
    just relating stuff that i have put together from a LOT of digging.

    if the cryo is tight, you can wet age easily a week or so. i wouldn't bother much more. i'm impatient.
  • Gator Bait
    Gator Bait Posts: 5,244
     
    Thanks Jeff, I will let it go at least to the sell by date. If I am patient I may give it a week longer, the cryo is good and tight and my frig is good and cold. Thanks for the help, I appreciate all the digging you have done on the subject.

    Gator

     
  • fishlessman
    fishlessman Posts: 32,663
    jmo but i believe the dry bag changes some of the rules with regards to some cuts and the top round he has is a descent cut to try it on, cheap but really underated for a piece of beef.
    fukahwee maine

    you can lead a fish to water but you can not make him drink it