Feeding Your Father on Father’s Day

I called my dad to ask him to describe his ideal Father’s Day meal if I were the chef. He answered the phone chewing. “Excuse me,” he said. “I’m just eating a piece of steak.”

There was my answer. My dad is a meat and potatoes guy to his core. “I’d want to start with escargot with lots of garlic and butter, followed by a Caesar salad. For the main course, I’ll have rack of lamb, with a side of those tiny little potatoes.”

I asked my husband and father of our two children the same question. “Steak,” was Mark’s answer. “It’s the most decadent meal I can think of.”

Why all the meat? Does celebrating their fatherhood touch that hunting instinct in their reptilian brain and make men want to gnaw on a mastodon leg? Mark said, “For me, the word ‘father’ conjures an image of an authoritarian, cigar-smoking man in a suit and bowler. That guy would eat steak. It’s like, for one day a year I should take on that role and eat steak and beat the kids with my belt.”

This from the man who has raised his voice maybe twice in his five years of fatherhood. He doesn’t even own a belt. And whatever Donna Reed fantasies he has about me he can shove straight up his ass. If I hand him a martini at the door it’s because somebody died.

So according to my admittedly small sample, dads want meat. I called Champe Speidel, owner of Persimmon Provisions, a specialty meat shop in Barrington, hoping for some quick advice on which cut to buy for the dads in my life. But instead I got a lesson that made me rethink my recent foray into vegetarianism.

His initial answer came fast. “You want a bone-in ribeye,” Speidel said. “This cut has two muscles on it — the culotte, which is tender and marbled, and the eye. During cooking, the fat on the beef will render, basting the meat and keeping it tender.” The bone should be an inch and a half wide so the meat is thick enough that you can sear the outside without “charring the hell out of the middle.”

His lesson continued. “Unless you’re talking about a flank, hanger or skirt steak, I don’t believe in marinades.” With a good ribeye, you don’t want to mask the beef flavor. Speidel says salt and pepper is all you need. Maybe a little garlic and fresh thyme if your dad is fancy.

Now that your ribeye is all seasoned up, Speidel recommends creating two heat zones on your grill — a hot zone to start the cooking and create a crust and a cooler zone to finish the cooking once you have a good sear. Now, I know men like their fire, but this is an important rule: Don’t let that gorgeous piece of meat catch on fire. It’ll create an acrid and bitter flavor. And even if your daddy issues are making you feel bitter, you don’t want to eat bitter. Take that shit to your therapist.

No grill? No problem, says Speidel. Put a pan over medium heat — cast iron if you have it — and sear the steak before putting it into a 300 degree oven to finish cooking.

My uncle, a professional chef, once caught me slicing into a piece of meat to check its doneness and chastised me. When a steak is cooking, it’s flooded with juices that settle back into the center of the meat once it’s removed from the heat. That’s why it’s important to let a piece of meat rest before serving, ideally for half the length of its cooking time, according to Speidel. Cut into it too soon and all those juices run out, leaving your steak dry.

After he was done yelling, Uncle taught me a trick. Put your left index finger on the pad of flesh beneath your right thumb. Now touch each finger on your right hand to your right thumb. Feel how that muscle tenses up? Compare the feel of that muscle to the feel of the meat you’re cooking. Thumb to index finger is rare, thumb to pinky is well done. And if that thumb to pinky muscle tension matches the feel of your meat, toss the steak to the dog and start over. That man raised you! He deserves better.

My mouth was already watering when Speidel brought up dry-aging. He compared the dry-aging process to cheese-making. You keep a 20-pound cut of meat in a cool, low-humidity environment with lots of air flow, which encourages enzymatic activity that breaks down and tenderizes the meat. Then he switched to barrel-aged whiskey. “You’re familiar with the angel’s share?” he asked. “Sure,” I said. During the aging process, a small percentage of whiskey is lost to evaporation. “That intensifies the flavor,” he said. “Same thing with dry-aging beef. You use a large cut so the meat doesn’t dry out, but that slight evaporation results in a tender piece of meat with an intense, beefy flavor.” Dry-aged beef, ripened cheese, barrel-aged whiskey … my head was spinning. I needed him to speak in short sentences.

“Get a 40-day dry-aged bone-in ribeye,” said Speidel. Got it.

Considering my plan was to head to the meat counter, stare at the steaks for a while and then gesture vaguely in the direction of whatever’s on sale, this was a good lesson. I might even take my dad to Persimmon Provisions around Father’s Day for a little daddy/daughter field trip just to watch his face light up in the presence of all that meat.