I’ve always thought the fat was the best part of the steak. It has the strongest flavor and really makes it “pop.” Lately I’ve noticed friends who cut off any largish piece of fat before eating their steak. I’m pretty sure it isn’t for health reasons because one of these friends regularly puts away a 20 piece mcnugget order. I’m led to believe that they just don’t like the taste of it. I’m curious who is in the majority. How does the dope feel?
I’m in the camp that cuts the fat off. Marbling throughout the meat is fine, even desirable depending on how it’s cooked, but the big hunks of pure fat? No thanks. It’s not the taste, it’s the texture…like chewing on a rubber dog toy. Making the steak healthier is just a bonus, albeit a nice one.
Uh. Just thinking about a big hunk of fat on a steak makes me queasy. It is disgusting.
Mmmmm. Best part.
Ewwww. Yeah it’s gross. You cut that shit out and throw it away.
Delicious!
Fat isn’t rubbery, though. The rubbery stuff would be the gristle that is sometimes between the fat and the meat. So, cut off the gristle and eat the fat.
Taste isn’t too good, either.
The best flavor in a steak involves a certain amount of fat. I like to start a sirloin in the pan so some of the fat melts down and cooks up with the meat. I then throw it on the grill to seer it and if I’m freezing any of it I throw it back in the pan with some mushrooms. I use the fat in the pan to cook up mushrooms with some butter/wine and a little garlic salt. mmmmmmm. I think there’s a container in the freezer.
I guess what I’m trying to say is that people often buy a more expensive cut of meat and end up with less flavor.
Fat chunks make me gag. I trim off even the smallest pieces I see. Unless it’s crisp fat. Mmmmmm…crisp fat.
Ditto. The only way I can imagine a fat chunk being the best part of the steak is (a) if it’s a poor piece of meat, or (b) it’s not cooked right.
Speaking of chew toys: when I grill a steak that has a big rim of fat around the edge, I trim the fat off, grill it until it’s at a soft-bacon level of crispiness, and then give it to our two dogs. They now get worked up whenever I so much as walk near the grill.
I cut it off. It doesn’t taste very good, and it’s not good for you, so why eat it?
I am not a big steak person but I do like the fat. When I was a kid, I would just get people to give me theirs and eat that instead of the rest of the steak. That sounds like a little much these days but I enjoy a bit or three of straight fat.
I’ll eat chicken gizzards and chewy chicken hearts, but please not a morsel of un-crisp chicken fat.
And the same with beef and pork.
Nothing better than crispy bacon, but I can barely tolerate any part of it left translucent.
Finely ground fat (hamburger) is fine. You can’t register the taste or the texture, so no problem. Trim that steak, please.
Moving thread from IMHO to Cafe Society.
Wife suggested I eat it once. Yes, it was tasty. Yes, it made me sick as hell. Yes, she was trying to bait me into doing something stupid, but I thought it was safe because she ate hers first.
Payback time was a few years later when she had her gallbladder removed the old-fashioned way. At least I managed to hold out for our surgeon (she knew him in high school) to get a few laproscopic surgeries under his belt. By the time he yanked our daughter’s he had done thousands.
I’m a fan of the fatty chunks. I usually eat it with the leaner parts of the meat to balance the fat to protein ratio. There isn’t usually that much taste by itself, but coupled with the leaner parts, it has much more depth. One rule though: the fat has to be right off the grill hot, if it’s cooled off, it’s a disgusting gelatinous blob.
The fat is an integral part of the full steak experience. I will occasionally, cut bits of fat and eat it with the rest.
At least, do not cut all the fat off the steak before you fry or grill it (people who broil steaks get what they deserve, and have the luck not to know it). Depending on how well you have cooked it, the lean and fat will be appropriately attractive. You need not eat everything you have cooked, but before you eat, it should be cooked intact.
Oh, god. I honestly think I may vomit. And I have vomited exactly one time since I was eleven years old. People eat the fat?? People who are not, like, Soviet?