Lesson Learned - Resting vs foiling

tazcrash

OK, well yesterday I made a pork loin that was marinating in Goya Mojo. Indirect @~350, it cooked in a bout 1.5 hours as expected. I pulled it at 140, and asked my helpers to just tent it, while I got the egg up to grilling temps for pineapple, and plantains (~20 minutes). 

Well, with grilled fruit, and veggies in hand I came in to cut the loin, and found it wrapped tightly in foil (I think I was sabotaged by someone who is old school, and wants pork cooked to medieval armor consistency, yet says they don't like it.)

I unwrapped the pork, and started promptly cutting 1/4" thick slices, at which time, I saw all my beautiful juices pouring out on the board. 

The taste was good, but it did come out dry for what we are used to.

Lesson - You can loosely tent a piece of meat to rest, but if it's wrapped in foil, it didn't rest, when you cut, those juices will flow! 

stike

you're right. resting meat is actually about letting it cool.  the colder the meat, the less juice will be lost.  think of that cold slice of roast beef the next morning.  no juices.  you kind of want a balance, though, because that cold roast may not have lost any juices when sliced, but it also feels drier, even though all the moisture (water) is still there.

i'm not saying you want to serve a noticeably cold piece of meat.  you just don't want it straight from the grill.  let it sit long enough to not only stop rising (through carryover, but to get a bit cooler.

in practice, i'll be honest, i rest only a steak for as long is convenient (to plate the sides, for example).  i don't care if juices run out on my plate, because they aren't going to be lost.

if cutting a large roast on a cutting board, i'll let it test a half hour or so though.

you'll hear lots of talk about juices flowing here or there in resting meat, 'redistributing', or moving to (or even away) from the center of the meat.  bah.  the water isn't free-ranging, or circulating around in some mysterious 'juice pathway'.  it's been squeezed out by the denatured proteins (not tightening muscles fibers, but on a microscopic level, in the proteins themselves).  a cooler chunk of meat will retain those juices better than a hot one.

just as water in a sponge doesn't travel around, neither does it in meat. more exterior portions of meat might be drier due to evaporation and being more (over)cooked than the middle of a roast, not because meat is driven to the center away from the heat