How to Cook the Perfect Steak | Chef Jean-Pierre

Well, hello there, friends. Today, very important video. How to cook the perfect steak. I figured there was a lot of information on the internet I didn't need to do in a video about how to cook a steak. But there's so much bad information out there that I decided to debunk all of the myths out there that are untrue. Number one, take out your steak at least 20 minutes before you cook. What does that do? Nothing. No, no, I'm telling you, friends, I know everybody's saying it. I've done it so many times. I say, let me check it, see what's happening. Take a thermometer, take the steak out, take the temperature, take it out 20 minutes later and do the same thing and guess what you get? Nothing. Maybe a one and a half, two degrees difference if you take it out 20 minutes before you cook it. That means nothing. So don't waste your time taking the steak out. Another myth out there. Don't salt it just until you're ready to go because it's gonna pull the moisture. That's correct. If you put the salt just before you cook it, that's exactly what's gonna happen. Matter of fact, we're gonna demonstrate it. All right, I got two steaks in here. This salt, as you can see, a little darker red, has been salted 24 hours ago. This guy right there, we just got it at the store. So this one has not been salted. You can see a little glistening in there. There's a little moisture in there. I wanna get rid of that. The secret of a good steak is moisture. We wanna get rid of the moisture. How do we do that? We take a salt. Now, be careful. I've seen guys out there putting so much salt in there, it ruins the steak. You don't wanna put too much salt. You wanna put enough salt, just a little bit. That looks like fine. We don't wanna put too much. That's a lot of salt already, okay? Just maybe, that's it. That's it. No more salt than that, right? We're gonna put it in. We're gonna rub it in. We're gonna flip it on the other side, okay? And we're gonna put it back on the other side. Not much, don't put too much salt. Don't put too much salt. You don't need much salt. You wanna put some on the side. And that's it. Now we're gonna take this steak. You're gonna be amazed. You're gonna love this. This is really good. I'm very excited to teach you this because every time I'm watching somebody doing it wrong, I'm like, mama mia, who taught you to cook a steak? We're gonna put this in the fridge, friends, 10 minutes from now. We're gonna come back. Let me put it in here. Just like that. Open. Oh, I forgot to tell you. You need a rack, a sheet pan with a rack. That allows you to get the air to circulate it. You don't wanna age a steak in a plastic bag or in a wrapper. Oh, the minute you get it home, they're gonna put it on the rack. If you're gonna eat it within a few days, put the salt on it like I just did. Leave it in there. Longer you leave it, better off it is. We're gonna demonstrate that in a minute. So I'll come back in about 10 minutes from now and you're gonna see what happened to the salt that I put in on there. You're gonna see by the process of osmosis, it's going to, osmosis. That's a difficult word for a French person. It's gonna remove, you're gonna see, it's gonna draw the moisture out. And the secret, that happens within 10 to 15 minutes. The secret is to leave it long enough, at least 45 minutes for that juice to go back in. Now that juice is nice salty. All of the juice and I have the right amount of salt. So don't let them tell you, don't salt it until you put it in. Salt it as soon as you get it and when you're ready to eat it. So we'll come back in about 10 minutes and we'll go over the other myth about how to cook the perfect steak. I'm gonna show you exactly how to do it. So we'll be right back about 10 minutes from now. All right, friends, 10 minutes went by. Just 10 minutes, that's all you need. You're gonna be amazed. Unless you've made the test before. If you did, then you're not gonna be amazed. Look at this, friends. Look at this. We gotta make sure the camera gets right in there. You see, this only 10 minutes. You see, the salt is putting out all the juices. So if we were to cook it right now, we lose all that juices. We don't wanna lose it. We wanna put it back inside. And this is the secret. The secret is right there. It's to have it dry outside. That's what happened. Now, 10 minutes, that's what happened. Within at least 45 minutes, it's the minimum you gotta do this, okay? 45 minutes to an hour. This is what's gonna happen. The juice went back inside. So now we're ready to cook. We'll go back and put this in the fridge later. Now we'll cook it. Now, a lot of people says to me, why don't you cook it and clarify about it? You can cook it and clarify about it. But if you do, you don't get as much of a cost. And you know, it's all about the cost. So an avocado oil is a very high smoke point oil and it creates a really nice crust. So we're using the avocado oil. Okay, you can use whatever makes you happy, friends. But if you use regular butter, you know it's gonna burn, burn, burn, burn. And we don't want it to do that. All right, so salt, we got it already. We don't need to do that. Pepper, you can put it now. It's not gonna burn or you can wait and put it in later. I like crushed black pepper at the last minute in it. If you can put it now, nothing's gonna happen to it. Some people, oh, you put it now, you're gonna burn. No, you don't burn it. It's really up to you. It's not a pepper steak, so I'm not gonna do that. The oil, I like to get it about 400 degrees. About 400 Fahrenheit. If you don't have one of those, just keep an eye on it. You'll feel it when it's 400. Now, an avocado oil has a great smoke point so you don't see it smoking. If you put olive oil in there, it's gonna burn for sure. Okay, now, here it is. Look, beautiful, big, big steak right there. Dry as a bone. Look at this. It's the same thing. Look at this guy right here. It's amazing. So we're gonna take it in now right now, friend, and we're gonna put it in. And now, don't touch it. We're gonna put this in the fridge because I don't like to leave it out. This, I'll eat it tomorrow. So now, no touching, no playing around with it. Let's make sure we got the right heat. We're gonna leave it alone. Now, what happens is I like to do a cast iron pan because it retains the heat. So then the steak doesn't take all the heat out of a thin fry pan. But if you have a good thick stainless steel fry pan or a copper pan, nothing wrong with it. Cast iron is the easiest thing to deal with. You just gotta deal with it, taking care of it. Make sure you have a handle of it when you put them in the oven. So what we're gonna do, we're gonna give it a beautiful crust right here. Let me make sure it's still going. And then let's talk a little bit about a very important thing. The salt. What salt did I use? I used a kosher salt. You want a kind of a crusty, thick salt, granulated salt, not a fine table salt. You wanna make sure you put it on. A kosher salt is perfect. Fleur de sel is another perfect salt for that. You also gotta gift yourself a thermometer for it. Get yourself a good thermometer. This is the $20 thermometer, it works great. This is the $100 thermometer, it's Thermapen. It's a great thermometer. This one, what's the difference between the $100 one and the $20 one? The $100 one reads in three seconds. The $20 one reads in about 10 seconds. So if you got seven seconds to spare, you save 80 bucks. Up to you, whatever you wanna do. I got them right here. We don't wanna forget them. Cause this thing about pushing the thumb and all that stuff. Oh yeah, if you push over here, it's medium rare. If you push it over there, it's rare. If you pull it there, it's well done. Hello? Try to touch your wife or your husband's thumb, you see completely different. So which one do you use? Hers or yours? So everybody's thumb is completely different. That makes absolutely no sense at all. What makes sense is the thermometer. And don't be afraid of poking. We'll talk about that in a minute. So I put it in. When it's a thick steak like that, like an inch, an inch and a half, I do not like, make sure it's good. I do not like to leave in the pan the whole time because here's what happens. You end up burning the outside in order to cook the inside. So we're gonna take it out and we're gonna get a beautiful crust right here. And we're starting to build the crust. We're gonna flip it on the other side. Now there's so many information out there. Do you flip it? How many times do you flip it? If you have a thin steak, leave it alone because you're not gonna build a nice caramelization of the Maillard reaction, that caramelization of the protein. You're not gonna do that if it's thin because if you keep moving it, you're not gonna build that front in the bottom of the pan, that Maillard reaction. So it's very important. So what I do is I cook it one or two minutes on each side, then I pop it in the oven for a few minutes because the oven makes it where I don't burn on the outside in order to cook the inside. So if you have a thin steak, you can do it in a fry pan the whole time. Don't worry. But if you have a thick steak, you wanna pop it in the oven. Otherwise, you're gonna end up burning the outside in order to cook the inside. Okay, so we're gonna put it in. It's a little smoky, but that's good. That's what we want. We're gonna wait. Don't forget, mise en place, we don't have much. I have a little fresh thyme. I have some garlic and I have some shallot and I got butter. I am gonna use some butter, but we'll use that at the end so we don't burn. Remember, butter burns at 250 degrees. If I put butter, all I got is burned butter. Who wants burned butter? All right, so what we're gonna do, friends, we're gonna take that fry pan. We're gonna put it in the oven. I guess I could use it like that. We're gonna put it in the oven and in two minutes from now, we're gonna flip it. I'm gonna show you, okay? So we leave it in the oven right now. In about two minutes from now, I'm gonna flip it. So I'll come back in about two minutes from now. Okay, it's been there two minutes. I'm gonna flip it. Flip it just a little bit longer. One more time. Oh yeah, we're getting a beautiful crust, friends. It's really looking beautiful. And we're gonna leave it in there another two or three minutes, and then we're gonna check it one more time. All right, it's been in the oven about a total of about six minutes. We're now gonna take it out, and we're gonna finish it up in a fry pan now, friends. All we're gonna do now, look, look, it's starting to look beautiful. We got a beautiful crust. Okay, we're gonna do the sides of it now. Don't forget the sides, friends. Very important, we get a nice side. And now we're gonna add some butter. Let me just finish the side. Now what we're gonna do, we're gonna add a little bit of butter. That's my best part. And then we're gonna add some, I got some fresh thyme. I got some shallots and garlic. Don't forget to do the side, very important, friends. Nice job on the side. And we're gonna spoon some of that beautiful butter. We're gonna spoon some of that beautiful butter right there, friends. Oh, there's extra butter. We're gonna spoon some of that extra butter right there on top, friends. It's gonna give it a little flavor. It's gonna take a little time. But this right there, friends, look at this. Look at this, ooh, baby. Look at this. The smell of it is amazing, intoxicating it. Another thing, you hear all the people tell you, make sure you sear in the steak right away to seal in the juices. The juice are gonna come out with or without a crust. So the secret is to let it rest, and we're gonna talk about that when we're ready to let it rest, friends. When we're ready to let it rest, that's when we're gonna talk about it. We're not ready to let it rest yet. So now, very important, we check temperature. I wanna take it out about 120. I love the sound of it. I wanna take it out at about 120, my friends. 120, 125, but I like it medium rare, rare, so it's up to you. If you like it more cooked, remember, friends, there's nothing wrong with the way you like it cooked. You like it raw, God bless you. You like it medium rare, God bless you. You like it medium, well done, God bless you. It doesn't matter. Don't let anybody tell you, oh, that's the wrong way to eat it. You're either rare or you don't eat it. Get out of my kitchen, okay? You eat it however you wanna eat it, friends, okay? Don't let anybody tell you your way to do it is wrong. Look at this steak. Now this is how to cook the perfect steak, my friends. We got a beautiful color. The smell of it is absolutely amazing. So now, we're gonna check the temperature, friends. Very important now. We're looking for 120 to take it out because the carbohydrate eating is gonna continue cooking. So if I have 120 now, I'm very happy. Oh, take it easy here. You gotta be careful. Don't go all the way to the other side. So ready to see what I got right here, friends. It says 125, but I went a little too deep. Oh, that's another thing, I went too deep. I'm about 120, 116, 120. You know, that's enough for me, friends. I'm just gonna let it rest just a little bit longer. Put a little more butter in there. The garlic is getting a little caramelized. That's okay, we're not gonna eat it. We just want that flavor right there. In another video, I'm gonna show you how to make some beautiful sauces. I decided I'm gonna make a whole collection of sauces, friends. All right, so we're gonna let it rest. It's very important we let it rest, friends. How are we doing? Oh, look at this. Does that look beautiful or what? Oh yeah, that looks beautiful. Look at this. We're gonna take it. We're gonna put it right there, however side we want to put it in. That's beautiful. Oh, look at that crust. Look at it, that's gorgeous. And we're gonna take a little bit of this right there on top, and we're gonna let it rest on a cutting board. And now I'll explain to you what happened, why do we need to let it rest so you understand it, the whole concept of it. Maybe for later on, I'll put some fresh thyme leaves in there so it looks beautiful. Don't be afraid to put some butter in there like that. Oh yeah, look at this, friends. Does that look beautiful or what? Wait until we cut into it. It's gonna be beautiful. Oh, we put this aside right there. Let me explain you a couple of things, friends. Next time I gotta put some herbs, some fresh looking herbs in there so we do a nice thumbnail. Well, here's what's happening with the juices. You know, you say if you cut it right away, you lose all the juice, you do. Here's what happened. You remember when I put it in a pan, you hear that sizzling? What happened is the outside and the both side are heating the pan 400 degrees. Right now, the outside of this steak is about 200 degrees. At that level of heat, the juices are being expelled. There is no juice on the outside of it. All the juice is in the middle of the meat. And the meat is about 120 degrees now on the inside. They can hold the juice. We need to let the outside cool at about 120, 130 so then the juices can go from the middle a little more on the outside and redistribute so then we don't lose all the juices when we cut. Oh, let me turn this off. Okay, you understand what I'm saying? We need to let it rest so the juices can go back from the inside and redistribute a little bit on the outside. And that's all we need to do. We need to let it rest. You need to let it rest about 10 minutes. Five minutes is not enough. About 10 minutes and then you slice it and it'll be absolutely beautiful. So we're gonna wait 10 minutes and I'll come back and we're gonna slice it. Okay, friends, 10 minutes went by. Got it? I wait 10 minutes. Be patient. And all we're gonna do now, friends, we're just gonna cut into it. I love that crust. Hear that? Yes, sir. And we're gonna cut right in, friends. And voila, beautiful. Beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, friends. Oh, yeah. Now it's time to get the fork out. Cut it however you want it, friends, but let me tell you, this is perfectly, perfectly cooked. Look at this. Bon appetit. Mm. Oh. I forgot. Mm. I'm tasting it and I'm going with the pepper. I forgot the pepper. One day I'm gonna forget my head. My mom used to say, if your head was not attached so good, you'd be losing it. Friends, oh, it's salty to perfection. This is how you make a steak. I hope you enjoyed the video. 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