Reverse sear questions

LKNEgg

Planning for this Friday night cook.  A buddy thinking about buying a bge and is wanting to see the versatility and flavor the egg adds, plus we will have kids over.  I suggested pizza.  He said "what about a steak"?  So I think we are going to try both!

I assume he is bringing some good (thick) filets or ribeyes, which I prefer to reverse sear.  

I was thinking we would warm the steaks to about 90 IT  while bge warms up and then FTC.  Heat the grill up to cook 4 pizzas (guessing 1.5 hrs with warm up and cooking time), then throw the steaks back on to finish and sear while grill is hot from the pizzas.

My question is how long can you let the meat "rest" between the warm up phase and the finishing sear?  Is 1.5 hrs too long?  I assume it will not retain any of the heat and risk over cooking and dry for medium rare with the long holdover and heating 2x.  The other option is trying to cool down after the pizza and opening it back up!  We all know how hard it is to cool an egg off!

I know the real answer to this problem is "I need another bge"!

Open to suggestions!   Thanks!

etherdome

I would do the pizzas last 

JacksDad

I definitely vote for the second egg. 

LKNEgg

@JacksDad  2nd egg will be hard to pass by the bride when the gasser is sitting there not getting used.   

Normally if not showing off the bge I would warm the steaks on the gasser and finish on bge.

GrillSgt

The flavor from the BGE can only be brought to your meat if you use it first. It will take about 40 minutes to get to 110ish (very variable) so temp often. Depending on thickness could be 25. A lot of people break the egg down and bring to heat but it is easier to pop onto a gasser at 700 or so. Flip often, medium rare at 125. Takes 5-7 minutes on the gasser. 

Toxarch

I agree with steaks first, then pizza. It doesn't take long to sear the steaks. You could even use some steak as pizza toppings. 

Stormbringer

The goal is to showcase the BGE. So to show versatility, the ideal would be to do both.

If you wanted to be really cunning, you could do this. Will take some co-ordination but I think it will work.

1. Prep some pizza dough and bread dough.
2. Cook the steak to 10F off desired internal temp at 250F, with the pizza stone in the LBGE. Whilst this is cooking, get the pizza shaped, toppings on and ready.
   
3. Tent-cover/FTC the steak (possibly shaving some off for a steak pizza).
4. Get the LBGE up to 600F, should be 3-4 mins.
   
5. Cook the pizza, around 6-7 mins.
6. Remove the platesetter, pizza stone.
   
7. Uncover and sear the steak.
8. Whilst eating steak and pizza, put the platesetter and pizza stone back in. Let the LBGE cool down until around 500F.
9. Cook the bread on the already warm pizza stone, making use of the residual heat in the LBGE as it cools down. Takes 25-35 minutes, depending on how much bread dough you made. For a 600g loaf with 75% hydration, it takes me around 30 minutes.
   

Three items, one LBGE. If your friend is staying over, they will get fresh crusty baked bread for breakfast.

Only downside is that the pizza stone does not have the normal amount of time to get up to temperature for the pizza.

I've actually done this with the pizza and then bread thing, works well.

Toxarch

You could always caveman the steaks straight on the coals. 

Foghorn

Toxarch said:

You could always caveman the steaks straight on the coals. 

That would have to be done before the pizza cook. After the pizza cook the coals will have too much ash. Coals for caveman need to be glowing orange. 

LKNEgg

Never done the caveman style.  Always wanted to give it a try!  Does it work OK on a lean piece of beef like filet or best on fatty ribeye?