SIDE DISH: How to Cook a Pretty Decent Steak

This is not a food blog. (I have, in fact, yet to figure out what this blog is about.) But I do believe that everyone should know how to cook a piece of steak properly – it’s the one thing a dude needs to know how to cook competently. So here it is: How To Cook A Pretty Decent Steak.

HOW STEAKS USED TO TURN OUT

Overcook it a touch and you might end up with this:

A slightly overdone steak.

And yet, when you cut it open you might see this:

Perhaps slightly on the undercooked side.

THE IMPROVED METHOD

Tired of cooking sub-par steak, I did a little rummaging on the interwebs and found this nifty recipe. This method allows you to by-pass all those pesky, nagging questions you used to ask yourself when cooking a steak:

Do I need oil on the frying pan? How long do I fry this thing for? Do I turn the heat up to max? When do I flip it? Does this look cooked enough yet? Do I need to cut it open to check? Goddamn it, it’s still raw inside.

Fret no more – here’s a method I’ve tried at least half a dozen times, consistently resulting in Better Than Decent Steaks. No guesswork involved – just follow these instructions:

Now that’s a good steak. Image courtesy of Google images – I keep finishing my steaks before taking proper photos. Sorry.

WHAT YOU’LL NEED

1 x oven
1 x frying pan
1 x steak (If you’re going to cook something for once, for goodness sake splurge a little and get yourself a quality hunk of beef. 1.5 inches thick, well marbled. No excuses.)
Salt and crushed black pepper
A small amount of oil

TOTAL TIME: 28 minutes

1) Set the oven to 140°C (approximately 285°F)
2) Grab a liberal amount of salt and go ahead and rub it all over your steak.
3) Repeat with the pepper.
4) Watch some Curb Your Enthusiasm while the oven preheats.
5) Put your steak into the oven for 25 minutes (medium rare).
6) Just before taking the steak out of the oven – heat up the oil in your frying pan.
7) Take the steak out of the oven and sear it in your frying pan until brown – this is more or less just for aesthetic purposes, and should take 1 to 2 minutes on each side.
8) Satisfy your inner carnivore.

Have you tried this method? Got even better results using another method? Let me know in the comments!