Resting meat fresh from your grill or smoker can affect or affect the flavor and texture of your meat. Discover the food science behind the coveted cooking technique and how to properly rest meat.
When it comes to good grilling, patience is a virtue that every aspiring cook must learn. From getting your grill prep and temperature right, to making sure you keep the lid closed so everything can cook properly, you just can’t rush a good grill.
Surprisingly, the concept of resting meat has been a bit of a touchy subject, especially among steak fanatics. We’re not sure who shy away from some cooking controversy – so let’s take a closer look at what resting meat is, what the science behind it is, and whether or not to rest your perfectly grilled steak.
What is leftover meat?
Meat resting means allowing cooked meat to rest for a period of time away from the heat it was cooked on before carving and serving.
It’s a practice many people die of cooking meat to help the meat retain more moisture and flavor and ensure the meat doesn’t overcook(especially important if you’re cooking steaks).
All meat loses moisture when cooked; this is a given and we often try to prevent too much from happening. For example, wrapping a brisket when smoking helps prevent “dying” and ensures we don’t lose the delicious juices from inside the meat. Nobody likes dry meat. In some cases where we’re concerned meat might be dry, we squirt marinade in right before cooking!
Why would we go to all that trouble to make sure the meat we’ve cooked is moist and flavorful only to have it all spoil and spill all those juices when it comes time to serve it?
The science behind resting meat
To understand the science of resting meat, we must first look at why we cook meat. Aside from the fact that cooked meat tastes better(and is safer to eat) than raw meat, we cook meat at high temperatures to break down the fats and proteins in connective tissue. If these aren’t resolved, you end up with tough, stringy, and fairly bland-tasting meat — the delicious flavors and textures all come from cooking those fats and proteins until they melt with the surrounding meat.
The only problem with this is that when we cook meat to the point where those fats and proteins melt and then get sliced into the meat as soon as we remove it from the heat, there’s nothing like those tasty liquids about it prevents escaping from the flesh.
If you’re letting meat rest, allow the overall temperature to cool slightly before slicing, which means the liquids in the meat have a chance to slightly solidify and thicken. If they do escape when cutting in, at least it’s a little slower and you don’t risk losing them all on the cutting board.
Calm vs Hold
The concepts of resting and holding meat sound very similar, both involve waiting a certain amount of time to serve the meat after it has been cooked, but the reasons and the way they are expected are where there is a difference are.
Resting flesh
Resting meat means taking it off the heat and letting it sit at room temperature for a while. This allows the internal temperature to drop to a point where the liquids inside have started to solidify; In this way, not so much goes wrong when cutting.
The goal of resting is to only let the meat sit for a short amount of time(so that it’s still at a satisfactory temperature to eat) so that the internal temperature has reached a point where the juices in the meat begin to thicken and no more Are lost when the meat is cut for serving and eating.
Hold meat
When holding meat, you remove it from the heat it was cooked on and then hold it at a constant, low temperature for an extended period of time. This often happens with foods such as brisket or other foods that can take a long time to cook. They are prepared in advance and kept until they need to be served.
There are a number of ways to hold meat – you can purchase “holding ovens” specifically for this purpose(although they are generally used in commercial kitchens); It’s also possible to store meat in your home oven by adjusting the oven temperature and wrapping your meat in butcher paper or aluminum foil.
Another method, favored by many brisket enthusiasts, requires a cooler and towels or blankets. First, the breast WILL be covered with foil or butcher paper and then wrapped in several towels to insulate the heat. This bundle IS then placed in a cool box with the lid closed, where it will remain at a relatively constant temperature for several hours.
The Myth of the Resting Flesh
While the science behind resting meat seems pretty good, there are some people who disagree and don’t believe that resting meat does much at all – especially when it comes to steaks.
Is Steak the Exception to the Quiet Rule?
When cooking steaks, especially those that are less likely to be done, it is important to remove them from the heat at the right time to avoid overcooking.
The problem with resting meat is that even if you remove it from the heat and let it sit, the heat isn’t immediately dissipated from the meat or other food(you know this all too well if you’ve burned the roof). ). While the outside of the food is still hot, the inside of the food can continue cooking; For this reason, some recipes recommend removing the meat from the grill as soon as the internal temperature is a few degrees below what you want, as the residual heat will keep the internal temperature rising for a few more minutes.
The thing is, that’s not necessarily supposed to happen with a steak. First, there is no exact science about resting meat. If you get it wrong too, you can end up with a steak that’s either overcooked or undercooked. Second steak should be eaten hot; If refrigerated for too long, fats can become waxy or chewy and crusts or applied graters can become mushy.
Steak Science and Studies
Numerous studies and experiments have been conducted to prove or disprove the notion of rest. One important thing to note is that with these experiments we can only really measure the amount of water/hydration loss and not the juiciness of the meat(juiciness is a fairly subjective scale and personal preference after all!).
Prof. Blonder conducted an experiment with two ribeye steaks – both of the same weight and thickness and prepared in the same way. Both were cooked the same way to 125f and medium doneness.
A steak was immediately cut into strips and the juices from the cutting board and the surface of the steak were soaked up with a paper towel, which was then weighed on a scale. The unrested steak lost about 1 ounce in weight through this process.
The other steak was rested for 30 minutes before being cut; It’s worth noting that in those 30 minutes, the rested steak already had some juice spills before it was cut. After the meat was cut up, the same process was repeated and all the juices were collected with a paper towel, which was then weighed.
The rested steak lost about 0.85 ounces of liquid, which is only a 0.15 ounce difference. The important point of this experiment was recorded that the steak that was left to rest showed an increase in internal temperature(thanks to carryover cooking) to 145f, resulting in the meat cooking well above medium rare.
Food blogger Helen Rennie conducted a similar experiment, but instead collected the juices from the plates of one rested and one unrested steak and weighed it. Again, the results for both steaks show very little difference in the amount/weight of juices released.
Ouch… to rest or not to rest? That is the question.
When it comes down to it, as with many things in cooking, it comes down to personal preference and what you think tastes best or produces the best results.
Which meat must rest?
Steaks aside, it’s generally agreed that all cuts of meat benefit from resting after cooking. The main difference is how long certain meats should rest and how carry-over cooking might affect them. As a rule of thumb, the larger the cut of meat, the longer it needs to rest. People offer various equations to calculate times for how long meat should rest; A popular one is “1 minute rest time per 100g of meat”, but the easiest way to test if your meat has rested long enough is to measure the internal temperature.
Ideally, you should allow the internal temperature to drop to 49°C(120°F) so you don’t lose too much juice while slicing.
How to Rest Meat
Although the science behind this is pretty deep, the actual process of resting meat is simple.
- Take your meat off the heat
- Place on a warm(not hot) plate or serviette
- cover with foil; If the foil is too tight, the meat will sweat and lose moisture.
FAQ
Do you need to cover meat when resting?
Covering meat when it’s resting isn’t a rule you have to follow; Some people prefer to leave food out in the open, while others like to keep it covered when cooking outside or in a place that’s particularly cold.
The most important thing to remember is that if you’re covering your meat when it’s resting, you want a tent shape over it. YOU should not cover resting meat tightly as this will actually have the opposite effect and cause the meat to lose moisture through sweating.
Does meat continue to cook while resting?
Thanks to so-called “carryover cooking”, the meat continues to cook even after it has been removed from the heat and left to rest.
What is carryover cooking?
Carryover cooking is the process that takes place when you’ve removed food from a heat source, but cooking doesn’t stop immediately. Instead, the outside temperature of the food pushes both inwards and outwards(what we would normally see as steam), meaning the food’s internal temperature can continue to rise even though the outside is getting cooler.
Writer & content creator. BBQ fanatic!
