My flatmate, who is from Uzbekistan by way of Israel, marinates his steak in seltzer, where I would use something acidic like Italian dressing or a vinegar-based sauce. I asked him about it, and he says it’s something his whole family does–yet I’d never heard of this before. Wouldn’t the carbon dioxide in the soda be released fairly quickly? What sort of physical or chemical effect does soaking meat in seltzer water have?
Club soda is acidic.
Probably about the same as soaking the meat in water. You’ll get a fully hydrated, juicy, chunk of meat.
Would that work? I was always under the impression salt was needed (which i guess is present in club soda, but not selzer) for the moisture to be drawn into the meat. That said, I wouldn’t have thought club soda has enough salinity to make it work well, but maybe my science on all of this is off.
FWIW, in the 1950’s 7-Up tried to launch several cookbooks of recipes involving doing all sorts of terrible things with the soda, including marinades.
I just checked the labels of Canada Dry club soda (55 gms sodium), and Schweppes Seltzer (less than 1 gm sodium) in a 10-ounce bottle. So, the club soda might have enough sodium to get some osmosis going, but the seltzer has no more than tap water. The seltzer might even pull out some of the meat’s natural salt.
ETA: Osmosis “tries” to even out the concentration of dissolved minerals on each side of the cell membrane.
My mother used to add 7-Up to her meatloaf. Every so often, I would mention this to someone and get strange looks. I guess I now know where she got that from.
Club Soda contains sodium bicarbonate (baking soda) which, among other things, can be used as a meat tenderizer. Club Soda also contains sodium citrate, which is a slightly tart form of salt, and would also aid in the tenderizing process. Respectively, these are the second and third ingredients on the label, right after carbonated water, so they are in relatively high concentration.
Seltzering steaks I think is a question more apt for CS than GQ.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
How does that follow? All we know is that there is less sodium bicarbonate and sodium citrate than carbonated water. We have no inkling as to its concentration from that info, unless there is a fourth ingredient we have a known amount for.
Coke is also (not unusually, in my opinion) used in marinades and even sauces. I’ve seen 7-Up in Filipino chicken dishes. I don’t think in and of itself flavored soda being used in a marinade is particularly weird.
Canada Dry reports that their club soda contains 80mg sodium per 8oz serving. Schweppes’ Club Soda contains 65mg for the same volume, while their tonic water contains 35mg, so there are some numbers for you.
Yes, we have numbers from upthread as well (see AskNott). What I’m saying is your statement doesn’t necessarily lead to your conclusion. Plus what does “relatively high concentration” mean? I don’t consider 80mg sodium per 8 oz relatively high. Brine is usually about 16 parts water to 1 part salt by volume. According to my calculations, an 8 oz brine would require 3 teaspoons of salt for the proper salinity, in other words, about 6900 mg of sodium.
I’m not sure the club soda quantities of sodium are enough for any sort of osmotic effect (I’m saying no definitely) or any “tenderizing” effect (I don’t know that salt has any tenderizing effect other than osmosis, though).
Osmotic pressure also drives the net flow of water from the less salty to the more salty side of a membrane. Even a distilled water marinade will give you a juicier, less salty chunk of meat.
I would have thought leeching out the salt from the steak would leave a drier piece of meat. I was under the impression that you needed a concentration of salt water higher than the concentration of salt in the meat to make the meat moister–if this does work, then why does nobody recommend soaking your meat in water before cooking it? I think an experiment is in order.
Folks, carbon dioxide in water leads to the production of a small amount of carbonic acid in solution, which means that club soda is acidic.
I think we established that in post 2, didn’t we?
Right, but tenderizing meat is accelerated by acidification. It essentially mimics and accelerates decay (and in fact helps degrade the collagen sheath most responsible for “toughness” in meat.) Read “Molecular Gastronomy,” by Herv This. Actually, the text in question is online here.
Right. Which is exactly why you usually have an acid in a marinade. I was just caught up in the whole osmotic debate.
Ah. I was just addressing the question in the OP. I sort of scanned past the osmosis debate.