Steak

I love steak. I love good steak. Once I felt off for a couple of months and in desperation asked my dad to make me a good steak and after I filled up on it I was like brand new. Good steak is my best friend. Sadly, bad steak is not, and in my experience most home cooked steak ends up in the bad steak category. Because of this, I have spent some time looking into what makes a good steak, and it turns out it's not as complicated as it seems to be after so many failures. It's quite simple. Good steak requires:

High quality meat
Olive oil (or another cooking oil)
High temperatures

And that is pretty much it. My bad steak days ended when I started buying my sirloin from Costco. Costco, is nearly always the answer, it seems. So, once you have purchased a package of high quality steak from Costco, the rest is easy peasy.

Grilling steak is a great way to go. But, in the winter months, I'm not one for grilling, so I broil. And since the winter months apparently includes May in Utah, I went ahead and broiled my dinner a couple of nights ago. The process is simple. You want your grill or your broil to be hot. You also want it to be instantly hot. Never ever ever put meat onto a warm surface to cook. It has to be hot. The heat sears the meat and prevents moisture from draining while it heats up. This is why broiling is so great, because it's that hot instant heat. (the same is true of pancakes and french toast, if you wonder why your pancakes stick to the pan and peel off in strange ways, it's because your griddle isn't hot enough).

Now, it is important to do some minor prep work on your steak before grilling/broiling it. I place mine on the broiler pan, then I coat liberally with kosher salt, black pepper, and granulated garlic. Then, you either rub the steak with olive oil, or you can spray it liberally with Pam cooking spray. And that's it. Broil as closely to the heat coils as you can, and on high. Allow it to cook for about ten minutes per inch of thickness, then turn it over and crisp up the other side (this will give you medium/well doneness, adjust a bit for a pinker or more brown internal meat). I repeat the seasoning and oil when I turn it as well.

Once you pull it from the oven, let it "rest" for about five to ten minutes before cutting. Once you pull the meat from the oven it will continue to cook for a few minutes as the internal temperature rises. This means that all of the tender juices are still really runny. If you cut into your meat during this time those juices will run out, leaving  nothing but dry steak.

And what to do with the leftover meat? We went for stroganoff last night, but you could also make steak salad, or fajitas. (Those Costco packs of steak are big, so I broil two steaks and then use one of the additional steaks for each following meal.)

Once the meat is done,