Steak and Taters

The Cen-Tex Smoker

Found a little treat at the local H-E-B tonight and figured we could whip something up. 

Wagyu Picaña, roared tri color potatoes, asparagus with Asiago, lemon zest, and garlic, and chimichurri. 

I salted it an hour before I seared it

then threw it in the freezer for 30 min so I could render the fat cap without cooking the steak

Rendering the fat cap on inverted grill grates 

Fat caps rendered

Blast seared for 1:30 a side

The chimi (above) 

 Below is chimi as board sauce, steaks left to rest over the chimi, and a little
mor spooned over the top

It was good.

Battleborn

My shrimp tacos seem inadequate after seeing this. 

GrateEggspectations

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

then threw it in the freezer for 30 min so I could render the fat cap without cooking the steak

Super neat technique. Where did you pick that up? What proteins and cuts do you use it for?

Gorgeous cook. 

Ozzie_Isaac

Geebus man.  You have clearly out grown us.  That is farkin phenomenal.

Photo Egg

Absolutely beautiful…!!!

ColbyLang

Love this cook. Even more because I just ordered 2 picana from SRF

johnmitchell

This is pure magic from start to finish!!!! Great post.

alaskanassasin

Good living man. We are going hard in the paint on some asparagus too.

Ybabpmuts

Damned that's sweet .... every single picture.

Never heard the term "board sauce" before.  It's better than the term "under my meat sauce", which is probably what I would have gone with. 

Ybabpmuts 

lousubcap

Dang.  Hit that cook right outta the park.  Great pics and the $$ shot...
Better to be lucky than good with that steak find.  You hover around HEB much??   :#

caliking

I'd hit that!

Love the technique for rendering the fat cap. 

dbCooper

Just great, all the way around!

The Cen-Tex Smoker

GrateEggspectations said:

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

then threw it in the freezer for 30 min so I could render the fat cap without cooking the steak

Super neat technique. Where did you pick that up? What proteins and cuts do you use it for?

Gorgeous cook. 

Thank you! I just thought up the freezer trick on the spot last night. The fat cap was really thick on one of them so I figured it would cook the steak before I could get it rendered properly. I thought if I started really cold, I would have a better chance to get it right. It worked. 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

Battleborn said:

My shrimp tacos seem inadequate after seeing this. 

Tacos are never inadequate 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

Ozzie_Isaac said:

Geebus man.  You have clearly out grown us.  That is farkin phenomenal.

You have clearly out grown us. 

Never! 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

Render porn 

Foghorn

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

Render porn 

The way that looks like bacon sizzling makes me think that you need to name this way of cooking picanha - 

BACONHA!

The Cen-Tex Smoker

lousubcap said:

Dang.  Hit that cook right outta the park.  Great pics and the $$ shot...
Better to be lucky than good with that steak find.  You hover around HEB much??   :#

Janell never goes in anymore. She always does curbside. I like going in. Never know what you are going to find .

I have also learned, being in a very busy tourist area, Fridays are insane at our HEB. All the tourist come in on Fridays and stock up for the weekend, HEB loads the meat counters with great stuff on Thursdays in anticipation of the masses coming in to drop their hard earned cash on a great cut of meat. 

lousubcap

BTW- the Fredricksburg HEB is the only HEB I have been in.  That was June 2019 during the brief tourist part of the brisket bender.  That meat department is impressive.  

The Cen-Tex Smoker

And last night’s taters make todays breakfast taco. Pan seared in duck fat, then add some bacon, eggs, and cheese. Yum!  Salsa is the red salsa from the salsa vault 

lousubcap

Crushin' it right there.  

Ybabpmuts

I had to give up my salsa vault in the great tomato deficit of the last century. Three little old wrinkled Italian women were banging on my door with a pitchfork and one had a phallus shaped thing that looked like an obscene french rolling pin. It was scary. One can only guess that you knew how to fight off a rolling pin. Good for you sir, and your salsa vault.

Ybabpmuts 

smbishop

Fantastic cook, your posts are always so inspiring!

The Cen-Tex Smoker

lousubcap said:

BTW- the Fredricksburg HEB is the only HEB I have been in.  That was June 2019 during the brief tourist part of the brisket bender.  That meat department is impressive.  

For being in a small town, we are really lucky to have such a great store. They aren’t all like this. Most of the small town stores don’t get too far away from the basics. 

being able to grab wagyu steaks, great wine, cheese, and produce in a town of 10,000 people is a luxury for sure. 

The Cen-Tex Smoker

smbishop said:

Fantastic cook, your posts are always so inspiring!

I think I missed my calling as a menu writer for overpriced restaurants. It really is just steak and taters after you remove all the fluff. 

Ybabpmuts

Wait ... you used fluff? I didn't see it and I live really close to the fluff factory. I think at this point most of my nose ears now have fluff in them, you should smell the trees around here, and everything else, come to think of it... It's like fluffapalooza 24/7. I have three cousins that wear charcoal underpants on their faces. They hate sweets apparently. I'm not saying it's related .. what I'm saying is this .... If you do take away all the fluff ... please take me with you AND the fluff.

Ybabpmuts 

caliking

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

lousubcap said:

BTW- the Fredricksburg HEB is the only HEB I have been in.  That was June 2019 during the brief tourist part of the brisket bender.  That meat department is impressive.  

For being in a small town, we are really lucky to have such a great store. They aren’t all like this. Most of the small town stores don’t get too far away from the basics. 

being able to grab wagyu steaks, great wine, cheese, and produce in a town of 10,000 people is a luxury for sure. 

HEB's MO is to know the neighborhood they're operating in, and customize some portion of their inventory accordingly. 

Different stores around here can really vary (in a great way). And, they've really stepped up their beef game in recent years. A new store opened up right by work, on the feeder road to get back home, so I'm excited about the potential. 

loco_engr

simply beautimus cook!

Thatgrimguy

Awesome cook!! Looks great!

lkapigian

Nailed it as always !! 

( avatar is creeping me out lol )

northGAcock

The Cen-Tex Smoker said:

Found a little treat at the local H-E-B tonight and figured we could whip something up. 

Wagyu Picaña, roared tri color potatoes, asparagus with Asiago, lemon zest, and garlic, and chimichurri. 

I salted it an hour before I seared it

then threw it in the freezer for 30 min so I could render the fat cap without cooking the steak

Rendering the fat cap on inverted grill grates 

Fat caps rendered

Blast seared for 1:30 a side

The chimi (above) 

 Below is chimi as board sauce, steaks left to rest over the chimi, and a little
mor spooned over the top

It was good.

Got to believe it was way better than just good.