My experience with dry aging beef at home

Epicurean Exploits - Food and Recipes
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After reading some of the interesting exploits by others here, I figure I will post my own little adventure over the last two years - dry aging beef at home. The concept is pretty simple and well known - leave the meat in the fridge and two things happen: 1) the water in the muscle evaporates over time and thus concentrates the flovor; 2) the enzymes in the muscles continue to break down the fibers and thus making the meat more tender. There are DIY articles online in how to do it.

Then I started thinking… people often drink verticals of the same wine to compare vintages. How about doing the same with dry aging meat? So over the past two years I started aging meat in varying periods of time, and started doing what I call “vertical steak tasting”.

My process of beef aging starts with a subprimal cut of beef, usually prime grade from Costco, but I have also done Wagyu from Snake River Farms, sourced from a friend who owns a few Japanese restaurants. Each subprimal starts at somewhere between 10 - 15lbs but I have done up to 20lbs. I use a dedicated fridge for this because the meat stinks (in a good way). There is a product called drybagsteak which is a special bag that supposingly let the moisture in the meat evaoporate but keep the germs out. Then it’s just leaving the beef in the fridge for a set period of time. I didn’t use a specialized fridge - it was just a really old fridge from sears. What you need is temperture in the loe 30s and low humidity so moisture evaporates from the meat (achieved with baking soda). At the end of the aging period I cut down the subprimal to steaks and cut away the dried up rind along the side. Then I vacuum seal each steak individually and freeze them quickly using dry ice. The idea of using dry ice is that the meat freezes so quickly that there is minimal damage to the muscle cells, and thus retains the juiciness of the steak as much as possible. After that, the steaks should keep well for 2 - 3 years in deep freeze.

When I cook the steaks it’s real easy. Since they are each already individually vacuum sealed, I just take them out of the freezer (or thawed in the fridge) and sous vide. Afterwards I either pan sear with ghee (butter), or throw it on my TEC infrared grill that goes up to 900F (as close as I can get to a real broiler at home).

My current inventory includes: prime NY and Rib Eye cut 15 / 28 / 35 / 42 / 49 / 63 / 77 / 100 / 130 days, Bone in Prime Rib Eye 42 / 49 days, and American Wagyu NY and Rib Eye cut 49 / 100 days. I built this up over about 1.5 years and over 20 subprimals. This had turned from an experiment into a passion.

When I do the tastings I always start with an unaged steak to establish baseline reference. Then I usually go in 2 week intervals, like 15 / 28 / 42 / 63 / 100, or 15 / 28 / 35 / 49 / 77 / 130, etc. I usually do one steak per couple and carve them into strips before serving, so people just get bites of different aged steak - again the inspiration comes from wine tasting. The idea is that as the meat ages the flavor continues to concentrate and get more intense, but the meat also continues to tenderize and thus loses the typical steak texture that people associate with.

I have done quite a few of these parties now and people tend to favor either the 15 or 28 days if they want more flavor. After 28 days the meat really loses the typical steak texture and many people are not used to that. However I have people who love the really aged ones. I even have one who though the 130 days aged was the best! Interestingly these people tend to be more experienced wine drinkers. I suspect they have a better trained palate to pick up different flavors in the aged meat. Some of these meat that had been aged for more than two months develop intense umami flavor that goes very well with mature bordeaux. My personal favorite is something in the 42 - 63 day range.

I didn’t keep track of cost, but I’d estimate around $20 a lb for prime. Costco sells them at around $11 a lb, I usually lose 40% of weight to aging and trim, and there is the cost to individaully vacuum seal the steaks and use dry ice to freeze. Depending on your perspective I guess that cost is either expensive or a huge bargain. Personally I have not been to a steak restaurant on my own dime for about 2 years now. Nothing else outside compares to what I have in my freezer at home. :slight_smile:

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Gary, really interesting experiment you’re doing. Thanks for posting.

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You are my hero. [worship.gif]

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Fast freeze normally damages cells. Causing them to lyse or break. In a cell culture lab the ideal freezing speed for live cells is approximately 1 degrees celsius per min. How this applies to beef (dead cells) and its effects on taste I have no idea. It might be something worth experimenting with.

George

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This is very cool and inspiring. Hoping to do something like this when I have the space. How much meat do you keep on hand at any given time? Seems like a lot.

Do you think you could describe your aging setup in a bit more detail?

Thanks for the great post.

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George, thanks for the insight into fast freezing cells, I will look into it. I got the idea from modernist cuisine - they claim that normal freezing causes formation of larger water crystals within the cells, leading to rupture of cell membrane. Then when thaw all the fluid in the cells (juices) leak out. Flash freezing leads to formation of relatively smaller water crystals that have lower chances in cell damage. They use liquid nitrogen in modernist cuisine, but as a mere mortal I thought dry ice was the next best thing.

Yeah, there is usually quite a lot of meat in the fridge. :slight_smile: This was the most I had, 7 subprimals going at the same time. I don’t have anything aging right now because I have about 120 steaks in the freezer and my wife is complaining about lack of room. However I do plan on doing 4 bone in rib eye subprimals this Christmas. I did 4 last year, got around 28 steaks at 2lb+ each, and they were gone in 6 months!

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The process is quite simple. I got the bags from drybagsteak. Then I got the subprimals from Costco (or your favorite source) packaged in cryovac bags. I then transfer the meat from the cryovac bag into the drybag and vacuum seal it. I believe their website has videos in how to do it. The point of vacuum sealing is for the bag to stick to the meat so it can “bond” to the bag and the water can evaporate. The white bars are bag sealer sticks that help achieve the best vacuum - I would vac in pulses, seal, vac in pulses again, etc. to get the best vacuum. After a few days the bag bonds to the meat and once the bond is achieved you can just leave the meat in the fridge. As you can see the fridge is just a normal household fridge. I turned it to the lowest setting and it was a constant 32 - 35F. There is a bowl of baking soda in there for humidity. From my research, humidity wasn’t that important in the aging process. So I just put in the baking soda to absorb the evaporated water from the meat.

Check out this link which was very helpful in my initial research. Went into lots of theory and also techniques in dry aging beef. http://www.beefresearch.org/CMDocs/BeefResearch/Dry%20Aging%20of%20Beef.pdf

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Great experiment! I’ve only had in the 18-40 day range, I would be excited to try older stock. I typically prefer those over 30 days since I tend to want that really nutty taste that comes with more age. Well done!

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Gary - Have you ever had in contamination issues or meat that spoiled?

George

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What a great read. Thanks for sharing your new passion.

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or you can do what I call poor man’s dry aging and wrap the steaks in paper towels for a few hours in the fridge. Don’t laugh, you can really get a nice crust on the meat.

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Never had any contamination or meat that spoil. The bag does a good job keeping the germs out. I did get a very small amount of mold one time on the 130 days subprimal but that’s only on the surface. That hard crusted surface also protects the meat very well.

However I am a bit concerned so that’s why I chose sous vide as the cooking method. I cook at 131F and keep it there for long enough to kill all germs, based on thickness using a sous vide calculator.

The really aged ones (100 days+) are novelties that I would not try again. I got the inspiration when we went to French Laundry earlier this year and they had a 100 days aged Wagyu. I started a 100 day Wagyu and a 100 day prime, but I had a crushing travel schedule and forgot about the prime until it was 130 days. Aging beef is really about letting the water evaporate to concentrate the flavor, and let the enzymes break down the fibers. When you age for too long you run into the risk of the meat getting too dry. However, if you have high quality meat with high intramuscular fat (like Wagyu or the real Kobe), you can age for much longer because there is enough fat to prevent the meat from drying out too much. My 100 day Wagyu turned out to be excellent with extremely intense umami flavor supported by fat so it did not taste dried out. My 130 days prime was too dry - when I cut it into steaks it’s almost like carving cured ham. Of course the problem here is that the meat is not cooked (cured), so I need to cook it and dry it out even more. The end result is like eating beef jerky with incredibly intense umami flavor. I was actually thinking it might be good in very thin slices with a salad, but it’s no good as steak.

Oh, one more thing - air circulation is really important. Look at the picture of my fridge above and you can see that my middle rack were wire racks (raided from the closet). It’s very important that the meat can dry out from all sides. I was too lazy to modify all the racks in the fridge so I only did the middle one. In that picture I put the fresh ones (noticeably a lot more red) in the middle while the other aged ones on the shelves. The water evaporates at an exponential curve and it really slows after 21 days or so, so I figure I don’t need wire racks when I am beyond that.

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Gary. Really cool thread. I keep trying to figure out where to store a fridge. Maybe I’ll try it with one of those dorm room fridges this winter.

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Cool, quite interesting. Sorry, all this keeps raising more questions for me as this is really fascinating stuff.

Do you know what the physical difference is between the dry age bags and a typical vacuum seal bag like what you’d use for sous vide? I take it the dry age bag wicks away water once this bonding you’re talking about is achieved–so maybe it’s more porous?

Drybagsteak.com seems to advocate not using a standing Foodsaver model vacuum sealer since it takes some fiddling to get it on a manual setting. (This is also the vacuum sealer I happen to have.) What do you use to “vac in pulses” to achieve the seal, and have you tried the standing model sealer?

A more theoretical question about the extreme edges of dry aging meat… if you were able to keep it moist (such as aging a piece of well-marbled Wagyu) and age it for a really long time, would the texture conceivably just become softer and more creamy because of the enzymes? I guess I’m asking that when the beef becomes less recognizable by your tasters as a steak texture, what does that mean?

Do you find any difference in the process if you divide the subprimals into smaller or portion cuts? I would imagine that with more surface area to meat ratio, the aging process would occur faster. Theoretically, do you think the speed of aging has an effect on the outcome (i.e., might a gentler, slower aging process lead to a finer product, as the common wisdom goes with aging wine in bottle, or does it not matter for meat)?

This is cool stuff. Thanks for continuing to share your experience.

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Sure! I love to share my experiences so I can learn from other’s experiences as well!

  1. I don’t know the specific differences between the drybag and normal vacuum seal bags. I don’t know how a material can let water out but not let germs in but that’s what they claim. The drybag material is a little opaque and feels like a polymer. All I can say is that it works from my experience. I started with one bag and I still remember my wife asking me to try it myself first before inviting people over. Ha!

  2. It took a while for me to get this down. You want a good vacuum so the bag sticks to the meat to create the bond. I use a standing foodsaver model that has a pulse setting. The drybag themselves do not have the “dimples” that create the channel for vacuuming, so I cut out a small strip of foodsaver bag and put it in the drybag to create that channel and lock that in the foodsaver. Then I use the pulse setting to vacuum until the bag roughly sticks to the meat. After that, while the foodsaver is still sealed, I use a white bag sealer stick to lock in the existing vacuum UPSTREAM from the foodsaver - basically create another seal before the foodsaver seal. That way I can release the foodsaver seal and still maintain a vacuum. Then I manipulate the bag and meat to massage out air bubbles or pockets toward the mouth of the bag - remember the bag is still under seal from the white bag seal stick. I also clean up the foodsaver and cut a clean strip of food saver bag for the vacuum channel as there is usually blood and fluids by this point. Then I recreate the foodsaver seal, release the bag sealer stick seal, and pulse vac. Do this 2 or 3 times and I get an excellent bond and seal.

  3. People are used to a certain amount of resistance when chewing down on steak. At the extreme edges of aging, the meat were so broken down by the enzymes that it loses that “chewiness”. The steak taste too soft. Sous vide does the same thing, but using heat to tendarize the meat and break down the fibers. If you sous vide for too long the meat texture turns into mush. It’s kinda like that with extreme dry aging. The 100 days Wagyu I did was excellent - there was enough fat to support it so yes the steak became extremely creamy and nutty. The 130 days prime didn’t have enough fat to start with. If I were to take aging beyond 60 days again, I would only use Wagyu grade or higher. I should note if I have to choose by taste alone, the 100 days Wagyu would hands down be the best. But it has low QPR. It probably cost at least $50/lb all in and that’s with my friend sourcing the meat at distribution without retail markup. Costco prime grade at 42 - 63 days at about $20/lb is the best QPR for me. I can have actual steaks as a meal instead of tiny bites of the Wagyu.

  4. Ah, good question - when you ask this you are starting to get the whole concept. No, I do not divide the subrpimals into smaller portions because of yield. Yes when there is more surface area the aging process would indeed occur faster. But there is also higher cost. You lose the additional surface area you created since it will be dried up and has to be thrown again. You also need an extra drybag and at around $15 each they are not cheap. I think the speed of aging does have an effect on outcome. Two things occur in aging - 1) water evaporates from the meat leading to concentration of flavor, and 2) enzymes break down muscle fibers leading to tenderness. The rate of enzyme breakdown is constant through time since you start with a certain amount of enzyme in the meat. The water evaporation process, however, is not constant - that changes based on surface area you expose to the meat, air circulation, relative humidity in the fridge, etc. When you “speed up or slow down” aging, what you are doing is really changing the rate of evaporation. Well that could be good or bad - make it too quick and the meat dries out it becomes tender, make it too slow and the flavor doesn’t get concentrated before the meat gets too soft. This is all theoretical anyways. I was not about to invest in new equipment for this, so I hold my aging environment constant (32 - 35F and one bowl of baking soda for whatever humidity that might result in) and find the best length to age given my equipment.

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What Tim said.

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If you’re worrying about bacteria getting in through a porous bag, I would guess you need a really good seal to prevent any bad rotting. (So those pictures of massive sides of beef just hanging and dry aging are taken in a sterilized environment, not one resembling a college refrigerator?) I guess getting that good seal is the trickiest part of this whole process then. Seems finicky to me–and while I appreciate the detail in the process you’ve put together, I am having a hard time visualizing it!

I’d probably be one of those people fascinated to try the super aged beef that doesn’t really have the steak chew anymore. Sounds cool, but probably not something you’d want regularly. The analogy to sous vide is helpful. Striking that balance between time and evaporation seems to be where the real challenge is once you’ve got the basic technique down.

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I’ve been in the dry aging “room” of a place that supplies a lot of top restaurants in Detroit area.
They don’t use bags, just place meat on wire racks.
They also have big blocks of salt in the room.

Just thought I’d throw these two points out there in case it makes any sense to you.

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Yeah those aging rooms are tightly controlled setups where they monitor the temperature and pressure. The blocks of salt are used to absorb moisture, kinda like my bowl of baking soda in the fridge. I actually think you can achieve the same results without the bag. The bag just makes it seem more safe since I won’t visibly get mold on the beef. It’s also an anaerobic environment that’s hostile to most pathogens. In reality, mold shouldn’t really grow in that low temperature environment. And even if there is mold, you are supposed to trim the rind / crust anyways, and the mold can’t get inside.

Yes getting the balance between time and evaporation is the real challenge. Different people also prefer different things. My wife for instance can’t take too much umami flavor so she prefers 15 days. The consensus favorite so far is 28 days.

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Gary after having read this thread I may have to come knock on you door to try some of this. [cheers.gif]

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Bring some wine! LOL.