Grill Maestro

If you’ve ever gone into a high end restaurant that served steak, they’ve probably talked about how they age their beef and how that makes for a better dining experience. Have you taken that at face value? I know I have, since I didn’t have a clue what aging was supposed to accomplish, but I do know that I thoroughly enjoyed the dining experience even in my ignorance.

Why Do We Age Beef?
Why do we age beef? If you cook unaged beef, it’s said to have a metallic taste and lacks any of that beef flavor. You will rarely taste this as it generally takes seven days, simply from processing time, from slaughter before the beef is cut up into nice retail-sized packaging. Over the course of those seven days, the beef is “aging,” and thus you lose that metallic taste.

What does it accomplish?
By aging beef, you add “beef” flavor, or gamy-ness (if you’re a fan of other meats such as deer). It’s believed that the full beef flavor is developed after eleven days. You also improve its tenderness as the muscle fibers begin to break down over time. Maximum tenderness is believed to reach its peak at eleven days as well. Eleven days seems to be the magic number here, though some studies show that leaner carcasses can show improvement for as long as 16 days (which makes sense, more muscle means more breakdown).

Downsides?
Obviously meat can only last a limited time between slaughter and consumption, aging reduces the amount of “selling” time available to retailers. However, the situation is more acute than that, the enzymes that break down the muscle fiber also start to decrease in activity and its those enzymes that protect the meat from spoilage.

Another downside is that 70% of lean meat is water and that water will evaporate throughout the aging process, thus making the meat lighter, a negative for retailers looking to sell a little more.

More resources on aging:

• Aging Beef by Richard J. Epley
• Aging Beef - Dry Aging by Derrick Riches