I confess, there are a few steak posts in this blog … but heck, my wife and I enjoy a good rib-eye, it’s one of our favourite meals. How to improve on it, though? We recently found a way to enhance the flavour by several notches … twice searing with a bone marrow glaze.

Continue reading“Bone Marrow Glazed Steak”→

Equipment

• Roasting tray
• Basting brush
• Long metal skewer
• Searing pan (unless searing over direct flame)
• Heat resistant gloves (optional, recommended)

Ingredients

You’ll need a cow bone, 6-7 inches long, ideally cut into 2-3 inch segments. I obtained this from a local butcher, they were disposing of the bones anyway so were happy to cut me a couple of pieces. It is also available to buy from some supermarkets. In addition:

• 4 steaks … or 1-2 thick steaks for reverse sear
• Dizzy Pig Cow Lick rub* (optional)

* – this rub matches the flavour of the marrow perfectly. If you don’t have this, you can try another steak BBQ rub or make your own dry rub.

Method

Decide how you want to cook your steaks – reverse sear, searing directly in a pan/on a BBQ or something else. The best results I’ve had are using the reverse twice-seared approach, which is described further down.

Extracting The Bone Marrow

Before or whilst cooking the steaks, extract the marrow from the bones. There are a couple of ways of doing this.

If you’re doing a reverse sear, place the bone in it’s own roasting tray and cook for about 20 mins longer than the steak. When the steak is ready, the marrow will have softened. Hold the bone with heat-resistant gloves and use a skewer to poke the marrow out into the roasting tray.

Alternatively, immerse 2-3 inch bone segments in lukewarm water (43°C/110°F) for about 5 mins. Then with your fingers, or a long blunt kitchen implement, poke the softened marrow out onto a plate. Gently heat the marrow in a saucepan to melt it.

Infusing The Flavour Into The Steak

When everything is ready, sear the steaks for 30-60 secs each side over direct flame or on a very hot skillet (or both, described in next section). Whilst doing this apply layer after layer of the melted marrow with a basting brush. The repeated application infuses the steak with marrow, enhancing the flavour to a whole new level of loveliness. Give it a nice crust/bark too.

Reverse Twice-Seared Steak

The best results for me have been to follow the standard reverse sear approach, doing two sears at the end:

1. A sear in a bath of bone marrow juice in a cast iron pan (pictured below). I put the CI pan into the Egg as it is warming as part of the standard reverse sear.
2. Remove the pan and doing a very quick sear over coals to get a slight chargrilled flavour into the meat. Drizzle a little melted marrow over to encourage the flames.

Hints, Tips and Pictures

1. The idea came from Rick Stein’s Long Weekend TV/DVD series. In one scene, a chef melted some raw bone marrow into a cooking steak using a searing hot spatula. I liked the idea, changing the approach to roast the bone to melt the marrow into a glazing liquid. You could try using raw marrow and melting it directly, of course.
2. If you’re using an Egg, make sure to burp the Egg before opening fully whilst searing. Also close the bottom vent (open it again when the lid is back down).
3. I use a two level setup in our Minimax to do this, with a small vegetable basket lined with silver foil to hold the bone:
   
4. For reverse sear, make sure that the steaks don’t overcook. If they are at temperature before the marrow is ready, simply place them in a clean roasting tray, cover the tray with foil and put a towel on the foil.
5. Dizzy Pig Cow Lick rub is available in the UK from Amazon.co.uk (affiliate link), BBQ Gourmet and Riverside Garden Centre.
6. There may be some detritus in the liquid bone marrow, filter through a fine strainer to remove this.