For my current contract I have to do a fair amount of travelling.
The client requires me to be onsite in their offices for two days a week.
This means I get to stay in a hotel for one night a week.
As you probably know, I am a bit of a foodie.
I LOVE steak, steak cooked well that is.
Whenever I stay in a new hotel, I try their steak (cooked rare).
Up to now, I have been forever disappointed.
No hotel cook seems to be able to get this right.
Its rare alwright, but so is the ‘rind’.
A good rare steak should be bloody as hell, but the rind of the meat, the connective tissue and fat surrounding the muscle, should NOT be. It should be seared, slightly crispy, and this partially rendered of its fat. This is not to reduce the fat, but to make the fat that IS there a juicy and tempting accompaniment to the protien of the muscle. NOT a tough rubbery shield protecting the meat from your knife.
Alas, I am yet to find a hotel that gets this right. And yet, I continue to try.