So, I was cooking some 3/4-inch Ribeyes one night. I started some charcoal in a chimney to toss on my trusty Weber Kettle because I wanted max heat for that great whiskey-colored crust.

It was getting dark and when I looked at the chimney, I noticed it looked like the afterburner of a fighter jet. Long blue and red flames, hardly visible. So I put a wire grate right on top of the chimney and tossed the meat on.

Perfect sear, deep mahogany brown, in less than 3 minutes per side and cooked perfectly to medium-rare in the center! In the image above, you can see me cooking some 3/4-inch ribeyes on three afterburners at the conference of the International Sous Vide Association with scores of hungry chefs in attendance. Fortunately, I had scores of USDA Prime ribeyes that had been sous vided to 131°F and needed a good sear. Needless to say, the steaks were a huge hit, as was the show, and now everybody is doing it. There are even small grates designed for the chimney being sold.

The technique works superbly on sous vide meats, and it can even be used on raw meats 1/2 to 1 inch thick. It will burn anything thicker before the center is done. It is ideal for outside skirt steaks, a long tough muscle rarely more than 3/4 inch thick, the traditional meat for fajitas. The secret is that it puts massive amounts of heat on one surface at a time and cooks it so quickly that the interior doesn’t get too warm. At regular grill temps the heat progresses through the surface to the interior, and by the time you have a good dark sear on the outside, the inside is overcooked.

That’s the problem with fajitas. You have such a tasty piece of meat in the skirt steak, but the center is almost always gray. Nevermore.

Afterburner Fajitas Recipe

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Chicago Style Italian Beef Sandwich Recipe

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Smoked Brisket Flat Recipe

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“Pittsburgh Rare” Steak

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This is an excerpt from the new book, The Meathead Method available on Amazon.

I have never understood why more people don’t grill meatballs. The grill, with a little wood smoldering below, gives them an added dimension. They can then be used in a wide variety of venues: On pasta, in soup, on pizza, as stuffing for pot stickers or other dumplings, on couscous, on a bed of steamed greens topped with grilled veggies, straight on frilly toothpicks, like candy, or my favorite, meatball subs.

This is based on the recipe that my wife’s Italian American mom passed on to her. She died some time ago, but if you are making her meatballs, she lives on. My hope is eternal life for Mom through you.

One secret is the panade, or milk-soaked bread, an old Italian trick that not only saves money by stretching the meat but improves texture and moisture. Another is to make them smallish, about the size of golf balls. The small size allows a higher ratio of crust to interior than a burger, and the crust is the best part. Not to worry about overcooking them, because if you use the right ingredients they will be as tender as a baby’s bottom, as juicy as a gossip column, as complex as a Chopin piano cadenza, and they don’t need any more sauce than does a rib-eye steak. But if you must, gahead and put marinara sauce on them.

You can prep them a day or two in advance, chill, and cook them when you need them. Or they can be cooked and stored for 3 or 4 days and then reheated. Or cook them and freeze them for 2 to 3 months. They’ll be there waiting when you are too busy to cook from scratch. If you cook them in advance, you can reheat them in the microwave.

Meatballs Recipe

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Can you sear a steak on a pellet grill? Well, the answer is, it depends on which pellet grill you have. Most pellet grills max out at 400 to 500 degrees, making a high temp sear hard to achieve. But, with the Coyote Pellet Grill, the versatile pellet grill that can smoke, grill, AND sear to temps up to 700 degrees, it is now possible to achieve that nice crust on a steak that can only be obtained from a hot sear.

Let’s redefine a classic sear versus the reverse sear. The classic restaurant-style steak sear involves searing a steak in cast iron or a hot pan to get a nice crispy edge and then letting it finish cooking in the oven to allow the steak’s internal temp to come up to the desired degree of doneness.

Why the Reverse Sear versus Regular Sear?

The reverse sear switches this process and begins by doing the smoke/roast part of the process first, finishing with the sear at the end. The reverse sear effectively gives the steak time to absorb the smoke flavor from the grill before searing it and sealing in the juices. To do a reverse sear on the Coyote Pellet grill, you want to first infuse the steaks with smoke flavor on smoke mode and then, when the steaks are near the desired internal temp, put the Coyote Pellet into sear mode and let those flames rip to get that perfect crust on the outside of my steak, effectively sealing in the juices and adding caramelization to the meat which adds to the overall flavor.

By not searing the steaks until the end, you give the steak time to absorb smoke flavor before you sear the steak and therefore seal in those juices, which results in the perfect steak: a beautiful balance of smoke flavor with a nicely seared crust on the outside.

For a grand finish to this steak, we are making a Cowboy Compound butter that you will want to slather on EVERYTHING in your house. Essentially, this is a garlic herb butter brightened with citrus and smoked paprika that really compliments the seared ribeye. You put this on at the end and you get a perfectly cooked bite with the herbaceous Cowboy Butter and you will be in steak heaven!

Reverse-Seared Steaks Recipe

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Smoked Brisket Recipe with Spritz King

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Brisket Scones Recipe

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Corned Beef Made-From-Scratch

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Best Chili Recipe

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