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Broiled Beefsteak
Lay a thick tender steak upon a gridiron over hot coals, having greased the bars with butter before the steak has been put upon it; (a steel gridiron with slender bars is to be preferred, the broad flat iron bars of gridirons commonly used fry and scorch the meat, imparting a disagreeable flavour). When done on one side, have ready your platter warmed with a little butter on it; lay the steak upon the platter with the cooked side down, that the juices which have gathered may run on the platter, but do not press the meat; then lay your beefsteak again upon the gridiron quickly and cook the other side. When done to your liking, put again on the platter, spread lightly with butter, place where it will keep warm for a few moments, but not to let the butter become oily, (over boiling steam is best); and then serve on hot plates. Beefsteak should never be seasoned with salt and pepper while cooking. If your meat is tough, pound well with a steak mallet on both sides.
A charcoal-broiling method from the era before gas grills and cast-iron ridged pans. Most of it still holds; the salt advice does not.
- Gridiron and heatA gridiron is a hinged or footed grate set directly over live coals. A charcoal grill with the coals raked into a single hot bed, or a cast-iron grill pan over high heat, reproduces it; the point about slender bars is real, since broad bars conduct too much heat and grey the meat where they touch.
- Salt, revisitedThe instruction never to salt while cooking reflects a belief that salt draws out the juices. Modern practice reverses it: salt the steak either immediately before it hits the heat or 40 minutes to several hours ahead, which gives a better crust and seasons past the surface. Pepper can scorch on a very hot grate, so it is fair to add it after.
- The hinge: do not pressThis is the one line to obey. Pressing or pricking the steak drives out the juice the recipe is trying to catch on the platter. Turn with tongs, never a fork.
- "Thick tender steak"Read this as a cut about 1 to 1.5 inches thick from the rib, short loin or sirloin. Anything thinner cooks through before it browns over coals.
- "Done to your liking"Over a hot bed, a 1.25-inch steak runs roughly 4 to 5 minutes a side for medium-rare. An instant-read thermometer at 125-130F pulled, rising to about 135F while it rests, is more reliable than the book's eye.
- Resting over steam"Over boiling steam" means a platter set on a pot of simmering water, an improvised warming plate that keeps butter from breaking into oil. The recipe asks only for "a few moments"; a warmed platter loosely tented, or a very low oven, will hold it as well.
- Pounding tough meatA steak mallet tenderises by breaking fibres, but it also lets juice escape. Reserve it for cuts from the round or chuck; do not touch a rib or loin steak with it.
- YieldNot stated. Figure 8 to 10 oz of bone-in steak, or 6 oz boneless, per person, with the buttery pan juices from the platter poured over.
Broiling over coals is among the oldest cooking methods and, through the nineteenth century, was closely associated with beefsteak as a mark of good living nplace to hide behind. The fussiness about gridiron bars belongs to a specific moment: cast-iron gridirons were cheap and everywhere, and the complaint was that their wide bars stewed and scorched the meat rather than marking it. The insistence that salt be kept off until the end was advice often repeated in Victorian cookery, passed from book to book on the reasoning that salt draws the juices, and it survived long after the coal range gave way to gas.