Prime Tomahawk Ribeyes on the KJ BJ2

[Matto6]

Shamelessly stealing the title from a nearby thread - tonight I pulled the trigger on some prime tomahawk rib-eyes, but unlike STLBBQer having the best steak of his life, these were some of the worst steak I've had in mine.

It was tough and had very little flavor. It was just flat out bad. Is this just a case of "blame the meat" or could I possibly of caused this?

They were Costco Prime Tomahawk Ribeyes.

• I bought them and drove home
• I did a mild kosher salt dry brine and left them in the fridge uncovered for 90 mins
• I cooked it on the Kamado Joe BJ2 at 230 until the internal temp was 117
• I removed the meat and got the soapstone up to 550F
• I seared for 1 minute per side and repeated until the outside looked nice an seared
• The final internal temp was 135

It looked BEAUTIFUL. But it tasted like a $10 cheap, tough, flavorless steak.

WTF did I do wrong? Just picked the wrong steak? Could I have known by looking at them? :-(

 

[STLBBQer]

So this is kind of crazy. Exact same cut. Mine came from Costco too. The only differences are:

I dry brined mine for 6 hrs

I let it warm at room temp for 2 hrs before putting on

I smoke roasted mine indirect at 350F until 120F, then took it off, rested it for 30 mins, then seared it over super hot coals.

I think it could just be the random bad cut. It sucks, but it happens. Your process seems spot on.

 

[ronbrad62]

It certainly didn't look like a bad steak. It could have just been the beef itself, and although it looked fantastic, there were factors along the way that affected the taste of the finished product. Hopefully, the next one will be life changing!

 

[Matto6]

So this is kind of crazy. Exact same cut. Mine came from Costco too.

So weird. And so disappointing.

I'm not the type to try to return things, but after paying $100 for the worse steak I've had in years, I'm thinking of returning the other steak and asking for a replacement.

 

[Matto6]

It certainly didn't look like a bad steak.

Thanks.

But unfortunately that's actually the frustrating answer. I'm OK making mistakes and producing bad food. But at this point it feels like a lottery. I don't know how to make good food in command when I need to.

Maybe Costco is too hot or miss and not shopping there is step 1?

Pfffft.

 

[jzadski]

That really sux about your steaks. I don't think you did anything wrong except got unlucky with cow. I purchased a bunch of prime filets that looked amazing but, they turned out like a cheap bar steak. 99% of the time the meat is good at Costco and Sam's. Stings a bit shelling out all that money though.

 

[Lahawk1]

Was it grass fed beef? I have had too many grass fed steaks that had almost no flavor that I stopped buying them.

 

[ModelMaker]

Maybe you have Covid??
Ed