Trimming Dry Aged Beef: A Plea and Primer

You've gone through all the hard work of aging (bagged or commando), don't be so quick to assume much of it needs to be tossed in the garbage.

I've ebeen looking into this stuff for years, and have found a couple suppliers near me (Julia Child's butcher, for one), and I trust them implicitly. They have been aging meat for at least 50 years, based on Julia's anecdotal evidence.

Anyway, it's not my opinion that trimming is verboten, it's really the actual tradition. Please give it a shot before you trim them to the point where they look like supermarket steaks.

Here's a primer on how I do it, which is based on how the two suppliers that I know do it.

I dry mine sans bag. The bags weren't available when I started doing this, and I have no reason to change. The bags do offer advantages over this method for the HOME ager, but this is about trimming. The esoterica only makes folks' eyes glaze over, so let's skip ahead to trimming....

the strip loin subprimal out of the fridge after 28 days.



Notice the near end of exposed flesh. I chunked off maybe half of it into steaks (for camping) before putting this thing into the fridge to age. This end was exposed for the entire period (28+ days). This is ALWAYS trimmed, because it is always thick, and dry and bark-like. Beyond jerky.

here is the subprimal chunked into steaks. notice the front piece is the 3/16" thick piece off the exposed end. this is sacrificial, and trimmed.



here are the rest of the steaks.
before grilling, i trimmed off the fat to half of it's thickness. i didn't need it all, frankly. i love it, but if it is there i will eat it, and i don't need that much. there is no reason to trim it as far as quality goes, as it is superb. dense, flavorful, etc. i trimmed it only so that i would not become an even fatter b*stard than i already am.

here is a steak close up. note the right side is the underside (well, non-fat side). this depth is still less than the depth of drying as compared to the cut-flesh exposed ends. i leave this ON. yes, it is tougher, but softens greatly on the grill



i will trim my wife's steak to remove the underside, and the excess fat (but not all).

so, what to do with the trimmings? well. here's a pic of the end trimming on the grill with my lunch. it is entirely edible, there's no food safety issue. it IS dried. but what is jerky? dried beef. I ate the thing as the chef's treat while the main steak was cooking. the small tail end of this piece was too far gone and hit the trash.

steak (and end trimming at right) on the grill



note that the steak shrinks minimally, and the fat tightens up, rather than becoming watery and floppy like a regular steak

on the plate, with my end-trimming at rear left.



which part of this was the part i was supposed to trim? i forget. even the tougher underside softened when grilled, and (as RRP says) is very much like a crust. yes, this bit was more leathery though. For guests? i'd probably take it off. but the flavor is better than the rest of the steak IMNSHO.

for comparison, these are 45 days aged steaks, purchased anywhere from 35 to 65 bucks a frigging steak. great stuff, but the price is why i dry age at home.

new york strip, 20 bucks a pound


I will say... if i am buying an aged steak, it is always the rib eye, frankly. a strip steak, raw (supermarket, un aged) is a great steak off the egg, and what i eat 90% of the time. but the steak which benefits by far the most (even fishless backs me up on this i think) is the rib eye. that's where the payoff is.

here's a rib eye.


notice that when grilled it doesn't fall apart like a regular rib eye steak, it firms up, actually. and the amount of fat is in much better proportion to the meat. it's all there still, it's just the water is gone. more flavor, less floppy fat...

same steak, grilled


another rib eye, almost a roast. aged 45 days. from a butcher. note that it is UNTRIMMED too.



the simplest thing to age at home is a small roast, for seven days or so. no need for the bags in this case. alton brown advises (after being vetted by lawyerly types) that simply uncovered in the lowest (back) portion of the fridge is fine. He adds that you can put it in a tupperware 'coffin' (pierced all over with holes) if you want to keep liquids or things from dropping on it as extra measure. but it is not required for food safety.

here's last year's (maybe year before?) christmas roast. five day dry-age.



nothing but salt and pepper and garlic. is there a prettier roast? zero effort so far...



no pics when serving from the first cook, but these are leftovers, reheated by searing the ends in a cast iron pan, then putting the CI and roast into the egg to warm up.



note that because it only aged five days, the slices still have the large eye of fat (and the line of fat) internally, and the slices fall apart like the steaks typically do when unaged. this is absent in a 21-28 day aged roast. compare these slices to the rib eye steaks above that are aged much longer. they are solid and don't cleave apart.



aging only a week or so will give you the enzyme action (tenderizing and flavor changes), but you won't get the condensed beef flavor and dense fat that you do from drying. still worth it, and a good test for the beginner.