David Chang Posted March 23, 2022 Report Posted March 23, 2022 Few weeks ago, i tried this with umai bags on a boneless ribeye roll. it was 3 weeks in and looking good, so i got more ambitious and added a picanha and pork rack. I had grates under each piece to allow air to circulate. Placed a usb fan inside to expedite air circulation and a water pan to add humidity. All the sudden, the fridge went out on me and I lost everything. The fridge compressor did not fail, but it did shut down because I think the fan was messing with the fridge thermometer. The compressor was constantly running, so I think it just decided to shut down before it broke itself. Had a tech look at it and it was working again, nothing was wrong. I think I want to try this again, but without the fan and water pan..and with one piece only. I've read that 30 days is not enough for a noticeable difference in taste, that you need to age 60-90 days for stronger flavours to develop. But you also end up with even more moisture loss and less yield. So a large bone-in piece would be ideal. Does anyone here dry age meat at home? Either with a dedicated cabinet or in your fridge with dry bags?
jonj Posted March 23, 2022 Report Posted March 23, 2022 @tekobo and @Basher do a lot (at least it seems a lot to me) of dry aging with dedicated aging cabinets. 1
tekobo Posted March 23, 2022 Report Posted March 23, 2022 Hey, you are starting an interesting journey @David Chang. Here's a link to other's adventures in this space. 2
jeffshoaf Posted March 23, 2022 Report Posted March 23, 2022 I've had a SteakAger cabinet for a year and it's performed very well. It uses a cloud connection to send alerts to my phone if there are any issues; so far, the notifications have been due to network, internet, or temporary power issues. Here in the USA, the SteakAger is less expensive than other brands; it's basically a Danby wine fridge with an added panel inside that adds circulation fans and monitoring of temperature and humidity. They also offer humidity control for longer aging (> 45 days or so) and charcuterie as an add-on. The associated app tracks the aging and charts temp and humidity. It keep a history of past aging or allow note taking but does let you download the temp and humidity data. If you look at SteakAger reviews online, you'll find a lot of negative reviews; these are mostly (all?) from an earlier collaboration with Kingsford that had Kingsford providing support (and maybe manufacturing). SteakAger is now handling support in-house with much better results. 1
David Chang Posted March 24, 2022 Author Report Posted March 24, 2022 7 hours ago, tekobo said: Hey, you are starting an interesting journey @David Chang. Here's a link to other's adventures in this space. oh i thought i did a search about this subject before starting a new post. i would have just contributed to your thread. thank you!
David Chang Posted March 24, 2022 Author Report Posted March 24, 2022 @jeffshoafyeah i was planning to use my wine fridge but it did not get cold enough and i don't know how to hack it to make it colder.
tekobo Posted March 24, 2022 Report Posted March 24, 2022 11 hours ago, David Chang said: @jeffshoafyeah i was planning to use my wine fridge but it did not get cold enough and i don't know how to hack it to make it colder. I started off using a wine fridge. Much cheaper than a dedicated dry ager but it broke down after about a year. I would not have had the confidence to use it for a really long aging process either. 1
