Steak on the Lake...or What We Did on Our Summer Vacation

This is a public service announcement...Vegetarians and vegans - turn away! I'm gonna be talking (mostly) about beef; in this particular instance - steak.

On Labor Day weekend, Significant Eater and I were lucky enough to spend time at our friends' home, on a beautiful lake, somewhere in the Adirondacks. And when he (a cook) and I (a cook) were discussing some of what we might indulge ourselves (and the wives) with over the weekend, steak popped to the top of our list.  As an aside, I'm always looking for a great steak, to be cooked at home or a friends' home; one of the reasons for that is that if you go out in NYC for a great steak, you can expect to spend a small fortune. Peter Luger's, a place many people think of when they think steak, fails to show prices on their online menu. Spark's Steak House, perhaps as well-know for its steaks as for its murders...

Paul C. problem outside Sparks - NY Daily News 

No prices. The Palm? No go. Suffice to say that if you plan on indulging in a beautiful steak, at one of the well-known steakhouses, plan on at least $50 per diner, just for your meat. But let's look at another way to enjoy a great steak.

First, procure your beef. Make sure it's at least of "choice" quality, though prime and various aged cuts are easy enough to find these days. Make sure it's good and thick (maybe 2"?) and nicely marbled.  It can be a rib steak, a rib eye, a T-bone, a Porterhouse, a strip, whatever you like the most - after all, you're cooking the damn thing. Then...

Fire.

Build yourself a freakin' hot fire on one side of your grill (ok, I realize many of you don't have grills. I don't. Use your imagination and pretend you do). Let the grill heat up once that flame dies down and you've spread the coals out. Scrupulously clean the grill. Be careful - it's hot! Place giant steaks over the fire for a minute or two. Turn them and cook for another minute or two. Turn them again - once they get a nice char, move them to the other side of the grill (yeah, I know - it's called indirect grilling). Cover that sucker and cook the steaks till they're done. (I don't know how you like your steaks cooked. I do know a good meat thermometer will help  - cook them until they're about 7° - 10°F less than what you want to finish with, as they'll continue cooking while they rest.) They may look like this...

Steaks - Done! Negroni in background.

Now, enjoy your Negroni (or Martini, or Manhattan) while those steaks rest. A good 15 minutes for these Porterhouses was how long we let them rest. Then...

Porterhouses sliced up real nice.

Slice them up. Everyone gets some strip and some filet. The bones are pretty great to gnaw on also. Leftovers?  That's simple...

Steak salad.

Steak salads for lunch the next day are a nice treat, no?

But don't think all we did was cook steaks. No - one evening we were enlisted to do a clam "boil" for about 2 dozen folks. Bushes of clams, corn, potatoes, kielbasa, and shrimp - all simply boiled in salty lake water. And then dumped onto tables covered with newspaper...

Clam boil.

That was fun. And my buddy's smoker got a workout too...

Smoker in action.

Ribs and duck in smoker.

There was plenty of time to relax. Sunset cocktails on the lake. Star gazing at night without any city lights nearby is pretty great. There's this view of their house as you approach via boat - the only access...

Lake house.

Everyone has dogs, and they like the boat rides too...

Pepper and Otis.

And at the end of the day...

Not a bad way to spend a long, summer weekend, right? Thanks, J & J!