How to Grill a Steak, According to Chef Curtis Stone
Chef Curtis Stone knows how to demystify steak cooking. His hybrid butcher shop/fine dining restaurant Gwen, which earned a Michelin Guide star, hand cuts some of the best steaks sourced from top farms. We chatted with him about his process of grilling the perfect porterhouse, a cut of beef which presents its own set of challenges. It’s often very expensive, and the steak is made up of two muscles—the smaller tenderloin and larger strip steak—that cook at different rates.
Though Stone's preferred method to grill the perfect steak involves an hour or so of breaking down hardwood logs to create the perfect, glowing coals, you can still get pretty damn close to peak steak by using lump charcoal. Lump is made from large chunks of pre-burned hardwood logs so you'll be halfway there and still be able to cook up some cherry-red coals for a sizzling crust.
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1. Prep Your Flame
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“My favorite way and the ultimate way to grill is using the live fire cooking method,” says Stone. “Which you can build in a kettle-style grill.” Stone starts the fire in the grill by igniting a small pile of twigs which are surrounded, tepee style, by larger sticks, in an assembly that is set off to one side of the kettle. Around the larger sticks place a few logs which will burn down leaving you with coals.
“Use hardwood like oak, maple, or hickory, that is aged or seasoned wood, not fresh or wet,” he says. You might need to cook those larger logs for about an hour or so, depending on the size, until they break down into coals covered in white ash. The idea is you want to grill over the coals, not a roaring fire.
Once the coals have developed, push them to one side of the grill, creating a two-zone fire. The coal bed should be about four to six inches deep, with about four inches between the top of the coals and the grill grate. Live fire cooking is one of the oldest forms of cooking, he says. “Just about every country and culture have a version of it—from street markets in Northern Thailand to barbecues in Central Texas.”
2. Use Charcoal
If you don’t have hardwood logs around, or the time to wait for them to burn down, Stone also uses hardwood lump charcoal. Where making your own coals leads to prolonged, even heat, using charcoal means cooking hot and fast. “The plus side to using these is that your coals are ready for cooking in a relatively quick amount of time, about 20 to 30 minutes,” he says. “But, you have a shorter window of cooking time before the coals lose their firepower, though that short window is still ample time for cooking steak.
3. Gauge the Right Temperature
Hardwood or charcoal, the goal is the same: to build a fire that has two levels with a searing hot side and a cooler side. Before you put the grill grate on, hold your hand about four inches over the fire. If you can keep it there for about two seconds, that’s high heat. Add more coals, or charcoal, to the banked bed to get more energy from it, or spread them out a bit if it’s too hot. It can be tricky to cook a thick steak like a porterhouse from start to finish on one heat level so using two helps prevent the leaner tenderloin section from drying out.
4. Prep the Steak
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About 30 to 45 minutes before the fire is ready, take the steak out of the refrigerator and let it come to room temperature. Season both sides of the steak liberally with kosher salt. “Be generous with the seasoning. It’s impossible to season the inside of the steak, so seasoning the outside is important,” Stone says. “It’s also going to give you that gorgeous crust you’re looking for.”
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5. Start Grilling
A big mistake Stone sees backyard cooks make is fussing with the steak. “For that caramelized crust, once you put the steak on the grill, don’t mess with it—it needs to stay in contact with the grill for at least a minute until it’s deep golden brown,” he says.
Aim to flip the steak about every minute so it heats evenly from both ends. When it comes to orientation, keep the leaner tenderloin portion of the porterhouse closer to the cooler side of the fire. If it’s a particularly thick-cut steak, you can move it to the cooler side of the grill after the hard sear to gently raise the internal temperature.
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An instant-read thermometer is a great investment to help you determine when the steak is done to your liking. Every chef has different target numbers when it comes to pulling a steak off the grill, but generally, it’s a good idea to remove the meat once the lowest temperature reading is 127 or 128 degrees, which will then carry over to about 130 for a medium-rare steak.
6. Let it Rest
Once the steak is cooked, offload it to a wire rack set over a sheet tray. “Do not use a plate which will only keep them sweating in their own juices and ruin that crusty exterior you worked so hard for,” says Stone. His ballpark time for the rest duration is about half as long as it took to cook.
Stone's Steak FAQ
What if the steak looks done but is a bit too raw when you cut into it?
If it’s underdone with a nice crust, then place the steak back onto the low-temperature zone of the grill and continue cooking it for a few minutes, being sure to flip it over as needed so that it cooks an equal amount on each side.
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Should I tenderize my steak before cooking?
Good quality steaks with nice marbling are naturally tender, so you don’t need to do mechanical or chemical tenderizing. These cuts are intended to be cooked over a high heat and a short amount of time—contrary to naturally tougher cuts of meat, like beef chuck, and beef brisket, which are super tough and require a long, slow cooking process like braising or low-heat roasting.
The best steak cuts for grilling include rib-eye, filet mignon, NY strip, porterhouse, and T-bone steaks. Flank steak and skirt steak are additional cuts that work well on the grill but are slightly less tender naturally.
How should I carve the steak?
After resting, slice beef against the grain. The grain consists of the muscle fibers that run in one direction across the steak. Cutting through these fibers (against the grain) makes the meat more tender and easier to chew. This is especially helpful for those flank and skirt steaks.
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