Dry Aging in the House!

Years ago, my husband expressed his dream of being able to dry age meat at home. One day, as he browsed Kickstarter, he exclaimed, “Someone invented my idea!” Naturally, he immediately “Kickstarted” this piece of equipment, called the Steak Locker… and waited. Lo and behold, about a year later, his Steak Locker was built and delivered. And here is the story of how we will fulfill his years-old dream. We call it, “Dry Aging in the House!”

Prep:

Our Steak Locker arrived and Jeff immediately installed it in the oldest/coldest part of our basement, right next to the wine fridge. My secret hope is that the two will mate and produce little tiny fridgelets. But I digress.

Once unpacked and plugged in, Jeff set up the atomizer (for humidity control) and the UV light (for preventing really funky things from growing) and we were ready to go! The next step? Pick the meat. Jeff decided on a bone-in NY Strip rack for two reasons: 1) Bone-in supposedly dry-ages better; 2) NY Strip is freakin’ tasty! We selected USDA Prime grade meat, which is less than 2% of meat available, because the marbling and tenderness are considered superior. Go big or go home, right?

I contacted one of Cheesetique’s vendors, Chefs’ Warehouse, to see what they had to offer. Allen Brothers is a pretty amazing producer and they had exactly what we wanted, so we had it delivered on Friday. Right into our kitchen fridge it went, to await my husband’s joyful return.

The Steak Locker awaits… the purple block at the top is salt (to control humidity and enhance flavor) and the green cube at the bottom is the atomizer.

Here is our Assistant Front of House Manager, Alexa, cuddling the 15 lb.  hunk o’ meat after it arrived in Shirlington.

Day 1:

Time to weigh the meat so we can determine the true yield once fully aged (the meat will lose LOTS of weight in the process). Our NY Strip sheepishly stepped on the scale…

Once weighed, Jeff opened, rinsed, and dried the meat.

Gloves are key.

Blot blot blot

Here is the proud papa with his pride and joy. We named it Bertha, just because we could never name one of our children that without her hating us forever.

Next, it’s into the Steak Locker! No trimming, so seasoning, no wrapping, nothing.

Rest well, my little morsel.

Finally, Jeff set up the Steak Locker app, which will automatically monitor and adjust temperature, humidity, and air circulation during the aging process (we’re aiming for 45 days).

And “Bertha” is born.

This will quickly adjust upward to about 70%.

This will quickly adjust downward to about 34 degrees.

That’s it for now! I’ll post updates every week so you can see how the meat changes. Then, in about a month and a half, IT’S FEAST TIME!!!