Pro Tip: If you wanted to serve a 45-day dry aged roast for christmas dinner, it's too late. But...

JustineCaseyFeldown

If you run out and get one tomorrow, you'll be at 37 days, which is not bad for the first time.


truth be told, this is a very old pic of a 'steak' (small roast), that I bought.  i don't seem to have any of my how-to-dry-age pics that i uploaded to photobucket a million years ago. 

i've been dry aging for maybe 9 or 10 years i think.  dunno. and answered more than a few questions about it.  unfortunately... no pics of the process.  looking now thru my files, my pics are few and far between. shrug. my photobucket account is toast. i posted most of this stuff a good number of years ago on the original forum.  the fourm this place ripped off.

i can tell you this, even if you only dry it for a few days, it will still be better than cooking fresh.

no one would call five days 'aging', but you will get crust and color at 225-250 temps far better than with a fresh roast.  you want the surface to dry as much as possible.

we aren't doing Christmas dinner for the extended family this year.  but no reason you can't.   get on it.

1.) buy the Christmas prime rib (bone in is ideal, but not necessary) TOMORROW.  three bone minimum, or the whole subprimal (seven bones)

2.) unwrap from the cryovac plastic.  rinse, pat dry and then...

3.) onto a couple cooling racks over a large cookie sheet.  you will get maybe one or two drops, max.

4.) into the beer fridge or the bottom (coldest) part of your kitchen fridge

5.) ignore until Christmas day.

6.) slice off the heel ends of the roast AND NOTHING MORE.  if you have the whole seven bone subprimal, hack off the Christmas roast from either end, and slice the remainder into steaks (vac seal and freeze those).

7.) don't trim a frigging thing, or the ghost of stike will come down your chimney and smother you in your sleep.  trimming is for pansies.

8.) pour a half dollar sized pool of oil in the palm of your hand, rub them together, and rub the roast with it. 

9.) dust/cover/slather with salt, pepper, garlic powder, herbs... whatever looks and sounds good

10.) into the BGE at 225-250 max until it is done.  when will it be done? who cares. have another frigging glass of champagne or wine, it's Christmas, and you have nowhere else to be. (couple hours max, usually).  yank it at your desired temp (120, 125, 130, 135...)  anything more than that and you should just microwave it



Steve "Doing God's work" Nelson
The Chicken-sh!t Ranch, Ontario (Steven's House)

gmac

Thanks for the advice. Here's yet another question you may be able to help me with. 

Most of the photos I see here are rib roasts or rib primals. I assume other roasts would be fine too. My local Costco has whole NY Strip loins right now. How would a loin strip age and does it take as long for a similar result given that it's a bit thinner?  Thx. 

steelcity314

I've never dry aged beef before, but you don't rub the beef with salt or anything before putting it in the fridge?

JustineCaseyFeldown

gmac said:

Thanks for the advice. Here's yet another question you may be able to help me with. 

Most of the photos I see here are rib roasts or rib primals. I assume other roasts would be fine too. My local Costco has whole NY Strip loins right now. How would a loin strip age and does it take as long for a similar result given that it's a bit thinner?  Thx. 

here's a strip loin i did. 


here's the seared steak (that piece at left is the 'heel' off the end.  the chef's treat.  basically jerky)



the yield



they get very thin when done.  you can go 45, but i dunno.  i like strips fresh to be honest.  i dry age rib eyes only now.  better cross section, more yield.

JustineCaseyFeldown

steelcity314 said:

I've never dry aged beef before, but you don't rub the beef with salt or anything before putting it in the fridge?

no.  anyone who told you that was necessary is just repeating some stupid thing a guy told them at a cookout.

Photo Egg

JustineCaseyFeldown said:

7.) don't trim a frigging thing, or the ghost of stike will come down your chimney and smother you in your sleep.  trimming is for pansies.

funny stuff...

JustineCaseyFeldown

hmmmm.  i logged into photobucket with an old email address, and found a few pics.  will see if i can find the dry aging step by step pics.

until then, here is a sad remembrance from a few years ago.  stike's obituary.  he was a real a-hole, to be honest, but this was a great obituary.

steelcity314

JustineCaseyFeldown said:

steelcity314 said:

I've never dry aged beef before, but you don't rub the beef with salt or anything before putting it in the fridge?

no.  anyone who told you that was necessary is just repeating some stupid thing a guy told them at a cookout.

Haha thank you!

bgebrent

steelcity314 said:

I've never dry aged beef before, but you don't rub the beef with salt or anything before putting it in the fridge?

No. You're not curing, your dry aging. Nothing on the roast. It's amazing!  Give it a try. 

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

Great post. Looking forward to the old pictures. 

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

JustineCaseyFeldown said:

hmmmm.  i logged into photobucket with an old email address, and found a few pics.  will see if i can find the dry aging step by step pics.

until then, here is a sad remembrance from a few years ago.  stike's obituary.  he was a real a-hole, to be honest, but this was a great obituary.

That's some funny ****! I hope they didn't throw that basement meat away!!

JustineCaseyFeldown

alright.  it is pretty frikkin simple.

put it on a rack (or two) over a cookie sheet.  rinse.  don't rinse, i don't care.

here it is on the top shelf of my beer fridge (empty of beer and jammed with meat)



top shelf is the rib roast (seven bones).
 not that it is germane to the conversation, but in case anyone asks... next shelf down was pancetta, savory bacon, and sweet/maple bacon.

below that, loin bacon or 'canadian' bacon.  so called because each one is the size of a full-grown canadian dwarf.

here's three or four bones' worth.  no, you don't need to tie it.  i did because 1.) i wasn't sure and 2.) it looked frigging pretty and that's all anyone here cares about



this is the thing ropasted at 225.  no reverse sear, no nuthin.  this is the "put it in the egg and have another glass of scotch until it is done" version rather than the "i'll show you all how great a cook i am and will make a giant production out of this and wear an apron and do a multi step cook just to impress you" version



and just because i can't believe these links still work after however many years... here is the rest of that fridge-meat all cured and packaged for christmas gifts...



and here is a pic of a p!ssed off cat



and the christmas puddin'



and the last photo of the only true friend i ever had.  he died christmas day, only ten years old.



thankfully, i got over him real quick.

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

That roast is beautiful in color. I've always seared but when I dry age I will roast from start to finish and hope it looks this good.

 Is that test tubes in the background with spices inside and wine cork tops? 

Care to share the pudding details? 

JustineCaseyFeldown

Eggdicted_Dawgfan said:

That roast is beautiful in color. I've always seared but when I dry age I will roast from start to finish and hope it looks this good.

 Is that test tubes in the background with spices inside and wine cork tops? 

Care to share the pudding details? 

yeah.  test tubes i bought as a rack for not much cash.  scientific online store.  filled with the stuff we use most.

i just googled for a half hour and had no luck finding them.  weird.  i foudn other stuff, but plastic racks, nothing simple like what we got.  i wrote the names of the stuff on the cork in india ink, because i'm an artsy fartsy type.

Christmas puddin... well.  i have a diary from when we came over in 1856, on a packet ship.  my great great great grandmother was so sick, that she couldn't cook dinner.  the passengers, even those in the state rooms, had to cook their own food from the  'stores'.  well, my g-g-great grandfather apparently had some coin, and he paid the captain's cook (not the ship's cook) to cook dinner for the entire trip.  six weeks....

on christmas day they had leg of pork and christmas pudding.  i have been trying various recipes for pudding over the year, and basically it is alcohol soaked fruit cake, almost like new england brwn bread, but worse.  not my cup of tea.  finally worked out a recipe that is lighter and figgy, and doesn't have the random texture of nuts and dried fruit.  so, upholding the tradition but not the technical english christmas pudding.

you can pour grand marnier or any other liqueur over it and fire it off.

---------------------

stike's half-arsed Figgy Pudding

2 eggs-beaten

1 stick of butter-melted

1 cup maple syrup (or molasses, or brown sugar, or mixture of all amounting to a cup total)

2 cups pureed figs (buy dried and rehydrate)

1 cup cream or buttermilk

1/2 cup finely chopped walnuts

2 1/2 cups flour

1/2 tsp baking soda

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

Mix wet ingredients, add dry, then stir well. Bake on 325 degrees for 1 hour and 15 min or until done (doesn’t jiggle).

Cool 15 minutes before turning out of pan (i use a small stainless steel mixing bowl, but they make molds for this too).

drizzle a little or a lot with grand marnier (or brandy, etc.), turn down the lights, and light with a long match. the longer you wait to light it, the more flame there will be due to evaporation. don't wait too long.

serve with whipped cream

adapted from a few online recipes

gmac

Lagavulin. Nice. Mmmm...smokey.  

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

Haha good story. I'm thinking that was a costly trip for grandpa. Thanks for the recipe. 

JustineCaseyFeldown

Eggdicted_Dawgfan said:

Haha good story. I'm thinking that was a costly trip for grandpa. Thanks for the recipe. 

I just checked and it was leg of mutton they had for christmas dinner. They were just off George's Banks. 

And the dessert was "plum pudding ", although i found out when first researching jt that it simply means a typical fruitcake pudding. No actual plums in the plum pudding

JustineCaseyFeldown

gmac said:

Lagavulin. Nice. Mmmm...smokey.  

Laphroaig is even smokier in my book. Both good though

Phatchris

JustineCaseyFeldown said:

gmac said:

Lagavulin. Nice. Mmmm...smokey.  

Laphroaig is even smokier in my book. Both good though

Ardbeg is nice and smokey as well.

caliking

If you like Laphroaig you may like The Ardberg. Quite peaty. 

Lagavulin Distillers Edition is just about my favorite scotch ever. 

BilZol

@JustineCaseyFeldown, question. We bought half a cow and had the standing rib roast cut at that time. Butcher wrapped it and we have it frozen. Can I take it out and do this now?

JustineCaseyFeldown

caliking said:

If you like Laphroaig you may like The Ardberg. Quite peaty. 

Lagavulin Distillers Edition is just about my favorite scotch ever. 

Like em all actually. 

Have not had the Distillers' Edition tho. 
Lagavulin 16   Damn good

BilZol said:

@JustineCaseyFeldown, question. We bought half a cow and had the standing rib roast cut at that time. Butcher wrapped it and we have it frozen. Can I take it out and do this now?

Sure. But i always advise people to buy and try a dry aged steak before trying to dry age a whole roast. And you may feel skittish aging a whole month the first time

but it can certainly be done now. Even a week will be good for color and crust. Juat won't be aged much in a week. 28 days is where the aged flavor kicks in

 But seriously, if you haven't tried it before, might not wanna do it for Christmas 

BilZol

Sure. But i always advise people to buy and try a dry aged steak before trying to dry age a whole roast. And you may feel skittish aging a whole month the first time

but it can certainly be done now. Even a week will be good for color and crust. Juat won't be aged much in a week. 28 days is where the aged flavor kicks in

 But seriously, if you haven't tried it before, might not wanna do it for Christmas 

Good advice. I'll try a week or two though. I know it's not much but it sounds like it's pretty safe. 

JustineCaseyFeldown

Safe isn't so much the issue as trusting yourself and knowing that it is gonna get brown and hard. And then all your guests go " um. So what is THAT?!?"  Haha

i never show anyone until it comes out of the bge

bgebrent

Never trust yourself, it just might kill you.  Sheesh.

bgebrent

Can anyone vouch for this self described "pro"?  He seems somewhat untrustworthy, at least when it comes to roasts.  Someone is gonna get sick.  #stike.

JustineCaseyFeldown

I don't think i ever described myself as a "pro". 

Eggdicted_Dawgfan

bgebrent said:

Can anyone vouch for this self described "pro"?  He seems somewhat untrustworthy, at least when it comes to roasts.  Someone is gonna get sick.  #stike.

This is funny! 

johnmitchell

Wow what a fantastic Post.. Very interesting and great pics.. Thanks.

Sea2Ski

It is a fantastic post, and timely as well. Bought my roast, and it is sitting in the fridge drying and rotting since Sat. Best part? A buddy of mine wants half, so we are splitting it. He insisted on $20 lb for my "time and inconvenience". Ummmmmm. Okay.  
Got a 19lbr for I think it was a tad under $11/lb for prime at Costco. So I think my 43 day old is going to cost me about $20 for Xmas


@JustineCaseyFeldown
Question about meat grade and dry aging. I know you can dry any quality meat. We also know fat is where the flavor is. 
So the question..... Is there a noticeable difference between a choice vs prime grade dry aged steak other than the fat content?  I know everyone's taste is different. But say I have 2 identical roasts on choice and one prime,  both aged 45 days, am I going to notice a difference once aged?

I am a firm believer that usually you get what you pay for, and I try to start with the best ingredients as possible. I also know you can make a great piece of meat not so good but a not so great  piece only so good.

Or maybe you want less fat when dry aging?

Just thinking as I am typing. I think you know I have done this several times, but I have always used prime.  Maybe choice is just as good in this case?

Thoughts?

Zippylip

but it had a face