A chef has revealed a common mistake people make when cooking a steak while trying to be fancy.
Will Murray, one of the co-head chefs at London’s Fallow, FOWL, and Roe restaurants, said that many people season their meat with thick, flaky salt and sprinkle it over the top.
The assumption is that this salt is more expensive than your regular table salt, and therefore, better for the steak.
Chef Will Murray has revealed the common mistake people make when seasoning their steak.
(Instagram/fallowchefs)
But Will said the opposite is true.
“Laying a bed of fine salt, and placing your steak directly into it, and doing the same on the other side, gives you a perfect seasoning crust,” he explained on social media.
Because the flaky salt has a bigger surface area, it can leave some parts of the meat untouched.
Regular table salt is much finer and can get into every nook and cranny on the slab.
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To prove his point, Will cooked two steaks using both versions so that home chefs could tell the difference.
“As you can see with the fine salt, it’s made a more even and almost supercharged Maillard reaction,” he said, referring to a chemical occurrence that encourages flavour.
“The flaky salt has limited contact with the pan, and it’s inhibited the formation of that beautiful Maillard crust.”
He said dipping the steak into a fine layer of salt can create a perfect crust every single time.
Many hit back at the advice
Despite Will being a certified chef, many people watching his video were unsure of his suggestion. Some claimed his method would make the steak far “too salty.”
“Did that, and the steak was next to inedible due to the extreme saltiness,” one claimed.
“I tried this – it made a lovely bit of ribeye completely inedible,” one added.
Some suggested that this would be better with a thicker cut of steak than what some cooks were using at home.
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Chef warns Aussies about pepper steak issue
It’s not the first time a chef has ruffled feathers by telling people how to season their steak.
Andy Hearnden, a Kiwi chef who won TikTok’s Food Creator of the Year award, said he never puts pepper on his steak before tossing it in the pan.
“Pepper burns — and I don’t mean a little bit,” he said.
Chef Andy Hearnden has said the one ingredient he avoids putting on his steak.
(TikTok/@andycooks)
“Piperine is a compound that gives pepper its heat, and it starts to degrade and turn bitter at around 150 degrees. Your average grill or pan is running way hotter than that.”
He said by the time the steak was done, the pepper isn’t cooked and is “completely burnt” instead.
Andy said that salt was different as it draws moisture.
“It penetrates and seasons from within,” he said. “Pepper sits on the surface and takes the full heat of the cook.”
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Dining and Cooking