The American Beef Institute is looking to rename your favorite cuts of beef, or at the very least, mine those diamonds out the rough cuts of beef that most folks scratch their heads in wonderment about. Seems that we, as a major meat eating nation, can fire up a grill or plug in a crockpot, can cook up loads of burgers, steaks and roasts, but flounder when it comes to figuring out what to do with the rest of the beast.So leave it up to science and a million dollar study to find out what the rest of the cooking world knew about years ago: there's more than one way to slice a cow.
Your average American has a lot to learn about variety meats, about braising and stewing and such. We tend to go for marquee cuts, not only because of their tenderness but for their ease of use. If it can't be pan fried, barbequed or crockpotted, well, we just can't have anything to do with it. In order for us to get the biggest bang for our buck we need to take a different approach. Learn to slow cook, turn those less than stellar pieces of steer into tasty treats. I think of Beef Bourgenon and know that once I put that first tender slice of beef into my mouth I tend to forget that it wasn't the priciest cut in the supermarket cold case.
The more that we study, learn and appreciate third world cooks the more we find that the large, expensive cuts of meat are not the stars of the show. Meat is generally a secondary player in most of those vegetable and grain based dishes. The more we learn to love those kinds of dishes the more we can feel proud about finding out new ways of slow cooking tough cuts for hours on end. Those raggedy muscle bound steer shoulders or fatty close to the rib cuts that we've turned our noses up for so long are now becoming the carne stars of the show. And so long as they remain the preferred cuts of those who haunt the ethnic neighborhoods that most folks from the suburbs generally bypass we'll be in good shape. Once they hit the Safeway meat counters with darling new names attached to them we'll have to find something new to cook.
But for now, let's enlighten the world, why don't we!
Cooks Talk!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/dining/29beef.html?hpw
Your average American has a lot to learn about variety meats, about braising and stewing and such. We tend to go for marquee cuts, not only because of their tenderness but for their ease of use. If it can't be pan fried, barbequed or crockpotted, well, we just can't have anything to do with it. In order for us to get the biggest bang for our buck we need to take a different approach. Learn to slow cook, turn those less than stellar pieces of steer into tasty treats. I think of Beef Bourgenon and know that once I put that first tender slice of beef into my mouth I tend to forget that it wasn't the priciest cut in the supermarket cold case.
The more that we study, learn and appreciate third world cooks the more we find that the large, expensive cuts of meat are not the stars of the show. Meat is generally a secondary player in most of those vegetable and grain based dishes. The more we learn to love those kinds of dishes the more we can feel proud about finding out new ways of slow cooking tough cuts for hours on end. Those raggedy muscle bound steer shoulders or fatty close to the rib cuts that we've turned our noses up for so long are now becoming the carne stars of the show. And so long as they remain the preferred cuts of those who haunt the ethnic neighborhoods that most folks from the suburbs generally bypass we'll be in good shape. Once they hit the Safeway meat counters with darling new names attached to them we'll have to find something new to cook.
But for now, let's enlighten the world, why don't we!
Cooks Talk!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/04/29/dining/29beef.html?hpw
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