Pork Steak
Remove the skin, beat without breaking into holes; scald with boiling water, wipe dry and broil. When brown lay in a hot dish. Sprinkle over pepper, salt, a little sage, chopped onion, and parsley; then butter profusely. Grate over all hard biscuit or crackers that have been browned and serve.--Mrs. S. T.
A gridiron recipe from a book that assumes live coals and a cook who can judge them by hand. The method is sound; only the equipment and a few habits need translating.
- What cut is meantA nineteenth-century "pork steak" was commonly a slice from the shoulder or the leg, though loin chops were also sold under the name, and thickness varied. Shoulder steaks have more fat and connective tissue and reward a slightly longer, gentler cooking than a lean loin chop.
- "Remove the skin"This means the rind, the tough outer layer left on some home-butchered cuts. Supermarket pork steaks arrive without it; leave the rim of fat, which bastes the meat as it broils.
- Beating the meatPounding lightly with the flat of a mallet evens the thickness so the steak cooks through before the edges dry. "Without breaking into holes" is the point: puncture the surface and the juices run out onto the coals.
- The scalding stepPouring boiling water over the meat was most likely a cleanliness measure, though the book does not say so. It does nothing useful now and works against browning, since a wet surface steams. If you do it, dry the steak thoroughly as instructed.
- Broil means over the fireThe original assumes a gridiron above hot coals. A charcoal grill or a heavy ridged pan over high heat gives the same result; a modern overhead oven broiler will also do, with the rack close to the element.
- DonenessCook to an internal 145F and rest three minutes for a loin steak. Shoulder steaks eat better carried further, to 160F or beyond, as the connective tissue softens. Hard-cooking pork was later justified as a guard against trichinosis; with modern pork it is not necessary.
- Seasoning after, not beforeEverything goes on the hot dish, not the fire: pepper, salt, a pinch of dried or a teaspoon of chopped fresh sage, a tablespoon of finely chopped onion, and parsley. The raw onion softens slightly in the heat and butter.
- "Hard biscuit or crackers"Beaten biscuit or plain soda crackers, dried in the oven until crisp and brown, then grated to a coarse crumb. Toasted dry breadcrumbs or crushed unsalted crackers stand in. They are there to catch the butter and give texture, so keep them coarse.
- YieldFigure one steak of six to eight ounces per person, and two to three tablespoons of butter for four steaks if you take "profusely" at its word.
Housekeeping in Old Virginia, compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree in 1878, gathers contributions from named and initialed Virginia housekeepers, which is why this one ends with "Mrs. S. T." rather than a page of explanation. Pork was the everyday meat of the upper South, most of it home-raised and killed in cold weather, and a fresh steak cut from the shoulder was a brief seasonal luxury before the rest of the hog went into brine and the smokehouse. The finish here, butter and browned cracker crumbs strewn over broiled meat, stands in for a made sauce. Sage with pork is old enough that its pairing needs no explanation on either side of the Atlantic; it appears in English cookery with pork and with goose long before this book was printed.