At the meat counter you’re presented with rows of red packages. Some are dark and lean, and some is thick with white marbling. For many of us it’s too much choice; we grab the one that’s on sale or just take home prettiest-looking package. Sometimes that’s fine. Other times we end up with a tough roast or a dry steak.
It’s not a matter of magic seasoning. It’s a question of knowing where on the animal the meat was cut from. When it comes to beef, a carcass is divided into eight sections called “primal cuts,” and these different section have unique characteristics according to what muscles were used when cow was living its life. Muscles used for heavy lifting, such as in the leg or shoulder, is full of connective tissue (collagen) and get tough. They require slow cooking over low heat to break down those fibers. The muscle in the back hardly move at all, they remain tender, and are best cooked quickly over high heat.
How to Pick and Cook Meat
Think about how the chuck (the front shoulder area) is realy connected up and full of connective tissue because it has to do a lot of hard work. Grill a thick steak cut from this part of the animal, quickly? You’ll get a chewy piece of leather. You braise it slowly in liquid. That collagen becomes gelatin. A meltingly easy-to-eat pot roast results, because it was cooked different than how the muscle used to move.
At the opposite end of the spectrum are those from the short loin that produce the filet mignon, T-bone, and New York strip. Because these muscles didn’t do much work, they is very tender and require little seasoning. Simply throw them on a hot grill or into a hot pan, sear the exterior until it’s cooked to your liking, and leave some pink in center. Speed is your friend here with tender cuts (they has less fat to buffer heat loss), but be careful not to overcook them.
The amount of marbling also matter significantly here. That is why you see all those little flecks of white, which is the intramuscular fat, on your steak. When it cooks, they will melt down and baste the steak from within. USDA Prime steaks has more marbling, while Select grade steaks are leaner. Even if you get a lean cut (say an eye of round from the hind leg), you’re not going to have the juiciness of a ribeye, it’s all about the fat.
This is not something you should of be a butcher to figure out. The fundamental rule is that tender meat requires heat and tough meat require time. Twelve-hour slow smoke in the pit makes a brisket from the lower chest tender, while a flank steak from the belly demands five minutes on a super-hot grill, then slicing against the grain. Get it wrong, and your timing wrecks texture immediately.
The other thing to know is that the grade make a difference too. Most supermarkets will only carry Choice grade, which is fine for cooking at home. They reserve Prime for steaks because it’s fatter, and they use Standard/Commercial for ground beef because you don’t care so much about texture. If you do buy something like a roast, knowing the grade will help set your expectations… You’re not going to have a melt-in-your-mouth moment with a Select cut if it’s really lean, unless you treat it right in the oven with plenty of moisture and patience.
Once you get your head around this stuff, cooking dinner becomes less about guessing and more about making an informed choice. You reach for a chunk of meat to braise on Sunday, knowing its collagen will melt. You might pick one for grilling on Friday night, knowing that fatty marbling is going to turn into flavor. It’s not rocket science, once you’re looking at it you’ll see the pattern.
So the next time you find yourself faced with a pile of those red packages, forget the package and consider the work the muscle does. Relaxing? Seer hot and eat warm. Exerted itself? Low heat and let it have its time. The bottom line is that when you pay attention to where the food comes from instead of only the cost per pound, the end product will be better.