Journey to the Center of the Pork Steak

[addicted-to-smoke]

Not much to see here but I'll tell you a tale. Been texting pix of my bbq-ing exploits to my dad and he shoots back, "What's next, how about pork steaks?"

Now, I grew up in St. Louis, but had to Google "pork steak" to learn it heralds from ... St. Louis. Oops, I guess I better give it a shot. (Dad used to do pork chops and pork steaks back in the day but didn't know the latter hails from the midwest either.)

This was going to be something HE ate --- he all but requested it --- so no experimenting at home just for myself this week while the wife and kids are away.

I tasked him with figuring out a brine because That's What Teh Internets Said To Do. Did some quick 'n dirty research, collecting about 6 Internet links I later ... didn't really use ...  but decided on a low and sorta slow 90 minute cook of the steaks. I got to the house later than I wanted, and rain followed me the whole way there.

He tells me he picked up not 3/4" steaks but some thin shit less than 1/2" thick. Damn southern grocery stores. Oh great, these are gonna be tough as shoe leather.

It was late afternoon, the rub wasn't put together, light rain began and so we began talking about punting and just going out to dinner and doing it later. The forecasts for both my parents' and my part of town say rain tomorrow and the next ... so putting it off wasn't looking good either.

Rain tapers and Dad makes the call to proceed. Can't get the gas flowing on his '05 Performer. The black knob spins on the valve. WTF? "Dad I need some pliers." "Oh, sure, if I still have any, aren't they all at your house? What kind of piece of shit grill is this, anyway?" Double ouch.

Pliers applied, gas flows. Pop-pop-pop-pop with the igniter and bam it lights with good flame. Not bad, considering 100% humidity and we have no other way to get coals going without the 10 yr old bottle of lighter fluid in the basement Which I Have Officially Declared Off Limits. 2 filled baskets, placed together in the middle.

Brine rinsed and mystery rub applied after some mustard slather. Coals seem hot but not completely. Gas off. Steaks get a sear, sorta, for a minute or so.

Now to switch to indirect and with less heat. A smart person would have left the coals alone and adjusted the vents to reduce heat and arranged steaks around the perimeter. But not me. I had a visual in my head that disallowed conscious thought.

We removed the grill grate, I moved one holder off to the side and I decided having the other one was now of course in the way. Too much fuel and in the wrong place for indirect. We put one holder in his 18.5" kettle and closed the lid and vents to save those coals.

**************

So the meat was now on one half and the heat on the other and cooking slowly. All good. "We'll wait, uh, about 40-45 minutes" sez I, completely guessing the outcome but wanting to cut down the time from the original 90 minute guide quite a bit because the steaks are "wafer thin."

So we wait, meanwhile Dad brings out a boneless chicken breast for mom. It's also been brined. "Say what? Why? Didn't you see the link I sent about the marinade? At any rate we aren't going to cook the chicken until the end."

Towards the end, we began "dabbing, not brushing" BBQ sauce. Here they are, mostly done. Or probably done but just resting.



Brine rinsed from chicken, I slap together a marinade and toss it in the bag. Back into the fridge goes chicken. Chik is about an inch thick on one end and wafer thin on the other. <sigh>

**************

There are 3 ears of corn to cook. I wanted to leave them in their husks and not deal with placing them under the pork's grate and there wasn't enough space for 3 on the grate over the coals. (Well maybe but it didn't seem so, and being so close to heat I'd have to constantly turn them, and lose all heat for the meat and ... and ...)

Heeeyyy ... that unused and forlorn 18.5" just had a basket of hot coals added to it. Top grate comes off, basket emptied on top of existing coals, everything spread apart for a 2-zone, vents opened --- AW YEAH, NOT WE'VE GOT TWO KETTLES GOING.

The filename for this image, however, is "corn_desperation.jpg"


Turns out, that one zone was basically dead and the other white hot. I don't know how I managed to do this. None of the corn got too burned and it tasted great, but not without a lot of shuffling and as you can see I wound up putting one ear right on the "dead" coals.

**************

Now that chicken breast. Thick side over heat.



Well not so fast. Turned at about the 4-5 minute mark and another 4-5 minutes but it wasn't quite done and had to go back for another 3.

Mom: chicken very tender, tasted good.
Dad: "Thanks for coming by to do this. Delicious. It was worth the wait. Not worth the effort, but worth the wait."

My own opinion is that we danced around too much with stupid logistical details like not having a decent place to set the hot grill when moving charcoal holders around (at one point we set it on the other grill, then another time on the ground). His only decent tongs for BBQ, 8" OXO, have a small hole at the end that won't fit on the Performer's tool holder hooks, and so on.

And my dad doesn't have patience with any hassles like that. He's done most of the cooking for decades, not mom, so I don't think doing a brine or a rub was a hassle.

Bottom line: The pork steaks were NOT tough, and more tender than I remember him doing them years ago, I think he agrees and had they good flavor.

[Bob BQ]

Aaahh, pork steaks...  good stuff.  Thanks for the post!  And here's a link to the latest cover story of Feast St Louis magazine, w/ how to's, recipes, and a bit of pork steak history.  Check it out!

http://www.feaststl.com/dine-in/features/article_062f2dcc-c7a2-11e2-aab9-0019bb30f31a.html

[1buckie]

"AW YEAH, NOT WE'VE GOT TWO KETTLES GOING."

  Next step is 5....from two to FIVE....that's the natural order of things here at the Weber Kettle Club.................

It's really easy......

[Chasing_smoke]

Glad it turned out on! They look great, and anytime you can fire up two kettles especially as old as that awesome 18.5 is your making a good meal! Keep at it pretty soon your going to have everything under your belt. 


"my kettle is more powerful it will do almost anything."

[Tim in PA]

If you don't already have one, get yourself a chimney starter! They are less than $20 and totally worth it. You'll never have to even consider the "10 year old lighter fluid".

Also, it looks like that one grill is pretty close to some vinyl siding. Forgive me if I'm seeing things wrong as I don't want to lecture anyone, but it doesn't take much eat at all to melt that. You don't want this:

[One Touch Platinum]

Oops, I would like the side of my house medium rare please. I hope that isn't a picture of your house.

[Tim in PA]

Oops, I would like the side of my house medium rare please. I hope that isn't a picture of your house.

Haha, certainly not! My house is brick but I still pull my charcoal grill away from the house.

[addicted-to-smoke]

You're certainly right, Tim, the ol kettle wasn't moved away from the thin siding. "Luckily" that was the side with the half-dead coals not cooking anything much useful.

We did move the Performer away prior to starting.

Update: I asked my dad re: "wasn't worth the effort" above. He mostly meant that for just the two of them at home he wouldn't have done all that and would likely have just slapped them on as-is, like in the old days. I actually think he might explore at least the rub and do indirect cooking now, whereas earlier neither would have crossed his mind.

I'm not convinced he yet knows how to start the Performer on his own, and with the black knob spinning in the valve that didn't help matters.

Yes he needs a chimney and I think the small Weber model would be a good one for both kettles. I didn't bring mine because I had "faith" the Performer would crank up, having recently cleaned out/tested the burner tube 2 weeks prior.

This morning we also talked about paraffin cubes and learned that the Gulfwax blocks sold for canning/candle making only melt, not burn ...