Why do some people like steaks cooked more on the rare side than the done side?

Factual Questions
21

I think to follow this line of questioning correctly and discover the hows and whys, you would have to look into the history of meat preperation by cultures Worldwide, past and present. I believe that there is probably a survival, and hence, evolutionary advantage to eating well done meat because it ensures that the nasties are killed off.

Really, killing of the nasties and digestive ease are the whole raison d’etre for the whole idea of cooking anything and the reason that man cooks his food. I say pink meat eaters just haven’t gotten sick often enough or are probably risk takers, and modern meat inspection and sanitation makes it safe enough for them to do so. If you look at most primitive cultures they only eat certain “safe” pieces of meat or organs raw, all the rest is thoroughly cooked or preserved. I don’t believe they make the gradation or choice of “rare” or “mid rare”, it is either cooked or raw. Eat Raw in the Bush and eventually you’re going to get sick.

22

But I am special because I like my steak bleu and my Buffalo Wild Wings wings “Blazin’” (well, I usually go for “Wild,” next step down, but I’m still more of a man than you are, and my wife is too ;)).

All kidding aside, I used to be one of those people that ordered all of his meats well-done. I attribute it to the constant brainwashing by the USDA and home economics teachers and other well-wishers. The first time I had a good piece of beef that wasn’t burnt to a crisp was entirely an accident. You see, there’s this appetizer in Mexico called “cecina,” which is kind of like beef jerky dried to a crisp. Truly delicious stuff. Of course I couldn’t remember what it was called when I went into the Italian restaurant in Irapuato, barely able to read Spanish. I could make out that one of their appetizers was thinly sliced beef prepared in some manner I couldn’t understand, and so I assumed it was cecina (yeah, even in an Italian restaurant; it was still Mexico, after all). I’d never, ever in my life heard of “carpaccio,” and I was disillusioned when the waiter brought us what looked like raw meat. With my then-bad Spanish I managed to ask if it was raw, and I was told it was, and sorry, but no, he couldn’t ask the chef to cook it a bit for me. The impulse to not eat it due to previously-mentioned brainwashing was overcome by the menu price, and I convinced myself that it was merely the rare portion of a rare steak, and people eat those all the time, and so I had nothing to worry about. Any you know what? I was awesome. I couldn’t believe that meat could taste so good. As it happens the hotel that I lived in in Leon had a steak restaurant underneath it, and we American workers ate there two or three nights per week. That’s where I started to order the center cut (rarer) portions of the prime rib, and ordering prepared steaks slightly less and less done until rare to medium rare was just perfect.

My wife at the point of having gotten married was just like me in the past. Couldn’t stand the sight of red in her meat because she thought it was raw. Having perfected my grill technique on thick, thick ribeyes, though, she’s come around – she just can’t resist the flavor, although I tend to give hers and extra minute or so such that they start to approach medium.

Now my real pet peeve is restaurant cooks/chefs that tend not to trust their customers when they order rare. When I pay $16 to $25 for a steak at a restaurant, you better believe I send it back when it’s overcooked, and I’m generally loathe to send anything back.

Lots of people have hygiene issues, I suppose. Consider that surface bacteria have a difficult time getting beyond the surface in an animal without a working circulatory system, so generally any microbes – if any – that are beyond the surface of the meet are things that don’t cause harm, after all the steer lived with it (and for pork, it seems that commercial animals no longer have trichinellosis; poultry still needs to be well-done, though). Surface bacteria that we worry about it added after the fact due to butchering, handling, exposure to the enviornment, and so on. So, for the most part, cook the outside enough to kill the nasties, and you’ll be okay.

Ground products (hamburger) present a different problem, because all of the surface nastiness is now interspersed throughout the product and has a chance to multiply prior to cooking. When you order less than medium well, anything that’s in there will still be alive and willing to attack you. For me, it’s a tough call. Some places used irradiated meat (I wish this were more popular) and so a delicious medium burger is in order. Others grind their own meat to order, and so the limited surface contamination won’t have a chance to multiply too much before you consume it. It helps that salt and other seasonings kills a lot of bacteria. At home, of course, I either cook my ground-beef to medium-well or better, or “grind” it myself (the food processor comes close; one day I’ll by a grinder at the Good Will or get an attachment for my mixer in order to get a better texture).

Oh, one of the reasons cheaper cuts of meat (such as the pork butt I roasted for 16 hours that only cost $1.50 per pound) are cooked well done is because that’s the point that callogen breaks down and makes the cut appear tender. All of the muscle fibers come apart, and the resulting gelatin makes an excellent lubricant providing a tender-like mouthfeel. Of course the individual fibers are tough as hell; you just don’t notice it.

23

Just a hypothesis, and I don’t know how you might get the information, but I bet there is a direct statistical correlation between people who have contracted and become sick or died from foodbourne parasitic or bacterial infections and their steak preference (rare or medium rare).

24

Cooks/chefs may have learned to err on the side of caution; they probably hear “not that rare!” more frequently than “not rare enough.” And cooking a too-rare steak a little more isn’t a matter of just popping it in the oven for another five minutes, either; a properly done steak comes off the heat and stands for a little while to let the juices reincorporate, so it’s not like a cook/chef could err on the side of rare and then “fix” it as necessary.

Regardless, you can clarify your order for the kitchen by specifying a temperature. Say, “rare, 90 degrees in the middle,” for pink and just warm through, for example. I’ve gotten much better results since I started doing this, and the cook/chef is assured that I do, in fact, know what I want, and what I will get.

25

The problem with rare/medium-rare/medium/medium well/and well scale is that there’s no universal standard with these gradings. Medium-rare is traditionally 130-140. The “updated” scale lists it at 145-150, which is in the traditional medium to medium-well territory. So, depending on what scale a restaurant is cooking to, you’ll get a swing of anywhere from 130-150 for a “medium-rare”, which is quite a range for anyone who really loves and knows steak. At 150, you’re cooking through the center, which is exactly the sort of thing I want to avoid when I order medium rare. It may still be pink, but it tastes and feels like cooked through beef.

26

It’s definitely not blood. Mr. Neville and I eat only kosher steaks. This means, among other things, that the animal has had the blood drained out of it at slaughter and the meat has had salt put on it to draw out any remaining blood. We’re definitely not eating blood, but there is a difference between medium and well-done kosher meat.

27

I think a lot of resteraunts don’t have really good control over how much they cook their steaks. I ordered a medium rare fillet mignon last weekend and it came rare. I didn’t mind, but a little more cooking would have been better. I’m never very good at predicting when the steak is right, so I tend to overcook my own steaks.

28

But here’s the question–what separates rare from medium rare to you? To me (although it’s hard to tell from pictures) this looks medium-rare. However,this medium rare steak looks more like what I’d call medium.

If I go to a larger chain restaurant, I have to order “rare” to get what I’d consider medium rare. If I go to a more upscale gourmet kind of place, I order medium-rare to get what I want.

29

A well-done steak, to me, tastes better since I like the salty-meaty flavors, and a grilled flavor brings that out more.

Having lots of fat on your steak, to me, would be similar to dipping your Pringles in a jar of vegetable oil before munching on them. To some people, diluting out the salt and gaining the feel of something liquidy on your tongue brings out “the flavor”, while as to me I think you’re just washing it out.

The same thing with bacon. I like it crispy because it’s all salty and strong-tasting, while as officially when it’s dripping with and tastes like grease it supposedly has “more flavor”.

30

you’d know it if you were ingesting blood. It has a very distinct metallic or coppery taste. I don’t think very many people like that flavor, in fact I think it’d be disconcerting to most.

When I was younger I ordered my steaks medium well. Mostly because I’m squeamish when it comes to meat and such. But now that I’m older, Ive aquired a taste for medium rare. Much better flavor and texture.

31

What a brilliant, obvious-in-retrospect suggestion! I shall begin to do this in the future. Thanks a bunch.

When it’s a cut I don’t make often, I break out the digital thermometer (I don’t have an instant read, yet, though). Otherwise the thick ribeyes I get at Sam’s (monster thick – why can’t grocery stores do this?) I’ve gotten down pretty much to the timing due to their consistency. If I have guests that don’t want bloody meat, I’ll still probe them. All of the TV chefs seem to promote the idea of feeling the steaks, but I guess I don’t have a sensitive enough touch.

32

I’m with you, that last steak is medium though it’s hard to tell from the picture. For medium rare I usually expect some portion at the middle that is completely uncooked. The steak I had this weekend was barely singed on the outside and mostly uncooked. Nevertheless, it was tasty.

33

You don’t really think any steakhouse or restaurant grill chef is actually going to take the temp of your steak do you? 90 degrees is a useless designation. They are going to handle your steak like the other 10 steaks that they are grilling simultaneously. They are going to go by experience and feel.

34

:rolleyes: That’s not why you do it. An experienced cook knows what the temperature designations represent in terms of doneness of meat, or he/she should, anyway. 90 degrees in the middle means pink, and just warm. He’s not going to measure it; he will cook the steak to that degree of doneness by feel. By giving an explicit representation of what you expect, you avoid having to send it back because of the “whoa I didn’t mean that pink” response or “rarer than that” or any of the other problems that the ambiguous descriptions permit. Tell the cook exactly what you want, and you will get it: not because he measured it that time, but because he learned it way back when, and knows what that means under the heat. Or you can be vague, and hope for the best. I have found, in my experience, that the method works, and works well. Try it or don’t. Whatever.

35

The more meat is cooked, the less it’s possible to tell a premium cut from a low-quality one. The fat gets boiled down and slathered all over the meat. The meat takes on a smell that I can only call musky.

When it comes to cooking in general, it’s basic chemistry that the more delicate aromas are driven off by heat during cooking. So if you have a steak that does have some nice complex flavor, it is a shame to send it all up the smokestack.

36

Aren’t restaurants required to have properly calibrated thermometers in the kitchens? I once managed an Arby’s and they had a log book for temps, and were religious about checking constantly. I would think that when a chef gets an order for a specific temp on the inside, he might just want to check it to make sure. Bad luck for him if the guy ordering is a food critic.

37

Oh, I see… You meant 90 degrees as a descriptor! Still, the naievete of that little trick is that you assume that the grill cook is actually going to be informed of that 90 degree addendum by the server. The ticket goes back R, MR, M, MW, or W.
The slammed server may or may not inform the slammed grill cook of “a 90 degrees rare” and incur his wrath.

38

Or in other words, rare folk are Darwin Award Winners.

39

Yea, well shit in one hand and wish in the other.

40

You quoted yourself, and did not back up your theory at all. Was that supposed to be a joke that didn’t turn out to be funny, or was it an insight that you have yet to explain?