Here’s the secret to enjoy a juicy cut of meat

A perfectly juicy steak that you order at the restaurants can be very well prepared at your home! Just spice it up aptly, cook it to perfect temperature, and then let it rest! Here, we share the biggest secret to get the juiciest piece of steak.

Cooking a beautiful cut of meat not only involves cooking it at the right temperature but one should also know when to put it to rest and for how long. The freshest herbs and fine grilling equipment won’t ensure a perfectly juicy piece of steak instead, there are other elements involved in cooking that actually turn a raw piece of beef in to a delicious meal. Read on to know for how long the steak needs to be rested to get that juicy texture.

If the steak is cut right after grilling, a lot of juice just spills out of the meat. Whereas, if the same piece of meat is allowed to rest for about five to seven minutes, you will be able to serve a much juicier slice and not the huge pool of juice on the serving platter.

This happens because during the resting time juice is distributed back in to the tiny cells all over the steak and not just concentrate at the center. However, upon over cooking, the juices are evaporated and you will get a dry piece of steak to eat.

And, of course, it is the food science that explains it in greater details. The idea behind resting the steak is to cool down the otherwise hot meat to 120 to 125 degrees F. Upon cooling, the meat juice starts to venture out to the cooler extremities of the steak instead of staying together in the center. This is the reason when you poke a hole at the center of the hot steak all the juices come out rushing as during cooking, they move from hotter area of steak to the cooler central region.

The correct guideline is to rest the steak for approximately as long as you have cooked it. But, remember that this condition applies to steaks that have been cooked to medium rare and not the well done ones as in them the juice has already dried out while cooking. Alternatively, you may also rest the meat for 5 minutes for each inch of its thickness. However, resting the meats between 5 to 7 minutes works best in most scenarios.

You can rest the meat by just placing the cooked steak over a cutting board and then cover or tent it with a piece of aluminum foil, large enough to cover it!