How to Cook a Steak on a Gas Grill

Hey, everybody. I'm Chef Tom with ATBBQ.com and today on Tips & Techniques, we're going to talk about how to grill a steak on a gas grill.

Let's get back to basics with some Grilling 101. If you're brand new to grilling, or if you're just bringing home a new to you gas grill, chances are one of the first things you're going to want to cook is a steak. Today, I want to share with you some tips and techniques that are going to make you successful right out of the gate when it comes to cooking that steak on your gas grill.

Now, before we even talk about the grill itself, we're going to talk about the steak. There are all kinds of steaks out there, different cuts that come in different shapes and sizes with different fat content. But one of the most popular and delicious and readily available steaks out there is the strip steak.

Now this is a great option for a straightforward grilling method like what we're doing today. Typically, not too lean, not too fatty and really easy to cook. These particular steaks are from Creekstone Farms and they are prime grade. You can see this beautiful marbling throughout here. These striations of fat, those add a ton of flavor and juiciness to your steak.

Now I'm going to be real honest with you here. The better quality steak that you buy, the better it's going to taste. Can you make a lesser cut taste better? Sure, but we're trying to keep this as easy as possible, so why not give ourselves a head start and start with a really nice piece of meat?

Now beyond that, you've got to ask yourself, what are my goals in the end for this steak? Well, I want it to be a bit crunchy on the outside. It should have some grill marks, a little bit of char, because that adds a lot of flavor and texture, but in the center, you're going to want it juicy. You're going to want a nice pink center, so we've got to accomplish both of those things, and we've got some ways to get that done.

The first way I'm going to tell you is buy a thermometer. A digital thermometer makes all the difference. Finishing at just the right temperature, which in the case of this, we're going to go for about 125 to 130, and then beyond that, there's a few things that you can do.

Now beyond finishing at the proper temperature, you got to start thinking about how to get that texture and that juiciness. One thing we can do is we talk about a dry brine. Now that's just a fancy way of saying you're going to put some salt on the steak and let it sit on there for a while before you actually cook it. Simplest form, that's what a dry brine is. It's putting salt on meat on the outside of the meat.

What happens in that process is that salt starts to draw out some of the moisture, which sounds like a bad thing until you realize that the salt's also opening up the protein and that liquid gets sucked back into the steak. Also, adding salt all the way through to the center.

Now you can do this with just salt or you can do this with any type of seasoning that's got salt on it that's also going to add flavor to the outside of the steak. Today, we're using a pre-packaged dry brine mixture, Cattleman's Grill Butcher House, which is pretty straightforward, salt, some sugar, some onion and some garlic.

We're adding really basic flavors, but the important part is it's got that salt that can be drawn into the steak, and then the sugar actually adds some caramelization to the surface for more texture and flavor.

This is going to go right on the surface of the steaks, and we're going to let this sit for about 45 to 60 minutes. We'll watch as it starts to draw out some moisture and then starts to dry out a bit. But you can do this with whatever flavor you're trying to work into these steaks. Although I should say most of the flavor is going to stay on the surface of the steak as the salt is drawn into the center of the steak. We'll hit these on both sides.

This is really simple. I mean, you get into the kitchen when you get home, you put some of this on your steaks. You let it start to sit. You start to prep for dinner. You go out and you fire up the grill to preheat.

Now being that we want these steaks to dry brine for about 45 to 60 minutes, that means we're not firing up the grill just yet. We're going to get there, but before that, I want to throw these steaks back into the refrigerator and I'll tell you why.

There's this myth out there that you should bring your steaks up to room temperature before grilling them. The idea is that by bringing it up slowly, you get a more even cook, but it seems that's been debunked over the years. I prefer to cook it from cold because I know that if I get a cold steak on there, I can get all the color I want on the inside, and then slowly bring up the internal temperature.

The other way around, it may work out that your steak goes on too warm and you end up not having any color on it before it's fully cooked, so you end up with a well done steak and that's not what we're going for.

Now one of the great things about cooking on a gas grill is it gets hot fast, right? But one of the things we don't always think about is the longer it stays hot before you put the food on, the hotter, it stays throughout the cook, which helps immensely in forming that texture and color on the outside of our steak.

Now today we're cooking on the Napoleon P 500. I'm going to start by cranking up all of these burners to high heat. We're going to let this thing sit over high heat for at least 20 minutes before we put the steak on. So, 40 minute update guys, check out the liquid that's standing on the surface of the steak. Now that's a good thing. It started the process, but what is not good is it hasn't sucked it back in yet. We're going to let this continue to do its dry brine work. Because if we were to just splotch this off to dry off the surface, we'd lose all that flavor in that juice.

We're going to let this sit for just a little bit longer. Now I know we talked about 45 to 60 minutes. That's really a minimum. Honestly, you could do this in the morning and let it sit in the fridge all day. The dryer the surface gets on the outside, the more browning you can get on that surface. I ended up letting these steaks sit for a little bit more than an hour, and at this point, that moisture is starting to disappear from the surface.

For the most part, pretty dry on the surface now. Any moisture that's left behind, I'm going to dab away with a paper towel because the dryer the surface of the steak, the better texture we're going to get out of these steaks in the end.

Now there's no need to add any additional seasoning. We did our seasoning when we did our dry brine. Now our grill is pretty screaming hot at about 650 right now. We're going to get all these steaks in the same general area. On this side of the grill, we'll leave the heat on high, but I'm going to go ahead and turn the right side down to low. We can get all the color we need as we move it around here. and then we can move to indirect if we need in the end.

Since we're starting with cold steaks, we can go ahead and shut the lid and not worry about over cooking. Now it's only been a few minutes and if you're wondering, how do I know when to flip my steak? It's when the grill lets go of your steak. See how it's sticking just a little bit? But it is releasing. That tells me that we're good to go ahead and flip.

You can see we got those really nice grill marks from letting these steaks cook on this preheated grill. See this one that's still sticking just a little bit? I'm not going to worry about it. We certainly don't only have to flip these one time. You can keep turning your steaks to cook them evenly. Don't think that you only have to flip it once. There we go.

Now after that first flip, I'll typically go ahead and check for internal temperature just to see where we're at? Okay, so on that opposite side, we're down near a hundred, which means that we need it to come up in temperature from the bottom up. Now there's only about 25 to 30 degrees to go, so I'm going to leave the lid open from here on out to finish cooking.

These steaks in front are coming up to temp, so we're going to move those to the indirect side while we take these steaks in back and put them on some fresh hot grates. These grates haven't been touched by protein yet, so there's a little extra heat coming off of them, and then we can continue to bring that temperature up from the bottom up.

With a few minutes on the hot grates, you can see, look at that crust, that overall sear, not just where the grates hit. That's what we're looking for. That kind of color. That's really pretty, but we're still not quite up to our finishing internal temperature, so we're going to go indirect to finish these guys.

Now, low heat here. We're going to close the lid and let these come up to 125 to 130. We've been taking these off one by one as they come up to temp, and we're finally all in that 120, 125, 130 range. That was about 15 minutes total cook time. Now what we got to do is let it rest. About five minutes is a good resting period for this, and what's going to happen during those five minutes is all those juices are going to redistribute to the ends of the steak.

You see, when you put any protein on a hot grill, what happens is all those juices want to run to the center? It's like a hamburger. You watch it ball up as it grills. Well, when you take it off and give it some time to rest, all those juices go from the center of the steak all the way back out. That way your slice at the end is just as juicy as your slice in the middle. Just wait a little bit. It'll still be hot when you're ready to eat.

All right, let's slice into it. Nice, really nice pink in the middle. See that fat has rendered and the juices stayed right in there and that's exactly what we're looking for. Man, look how juicy that is, and we can expect that a lot of that salt flavor is already carried to the interior of the steak because of that dry brine.

Don't forget as you rest, some juices are going to come out of the steak, which is totally normal, cannot be helped, but they should not be discarded. Pour that right over your slices to add all that extra flavor and moisture to the meat.

All right, let's get a bite. Oh, man, so tender, so juicy, but a great crunch around the outside. For sure tasting all of that dry brine. It's slightly salty. You get just a hint of that sweetness that's caramelized on the surface and some well-rounded aromatics from the garlic and the onion. Texture's killer, really nice.

Obviously, there's lots of ways to cook a steak and you could cook a steak on any type of grill. But if you're starting out on a gas grill, just need a few simple tips and techniques to get you there. I feel like that's what we've covered today, so let me go through, them just one more time to break it down.

First of all, there's meat selection. The better meat you buy, the better it's going to taste in the end. Then we had our dry brine, adds a lot to the whole situation from juiciness, flavor and texture. Then you got to remember, preheat that grill. It needs to be really hot in there for a little bit of an extended period of time.

Keep flipping those steaks however many times you need to to get a great, even crust. You can always finish over a lower temperature indirect and use your thermometer. Finally, let that steak rest so the juices can redistribute and you're all set.

Thank you guys so much for watching. Be sure to check ATBBQ.com for all the products featured in today's video. If you enjoyed that video, hit the subscribe button, and if you have any questions or comments or there's anything you'd like to see me cook, let me know in the comment section down below, and let's be good to one another.

For more recipes, tips and techniques, head over to ATBBQ.com/thesauce. All Things Barbecue where barbecue legends are made.

• Creekstone Farms Prime Strip Steaks
• Cattleman’s Grill Butcher House Brine

Evenly sprinkle about 1/2 -3/4 teaspoon Cattleman’s Grill Butcher House Brine on each steak (both sides). Place in the refrigerator, uncovered, until the moisture that is drawn out of the meat is reabsorbed, at least 45 minutes. You can also leave them for hours. There is no problem with starting your dry brine the morning before the dinner for which you are cooking.

Preheat your Napoleon Prestige P500RSIB-3 Gas Grill, turning all burners to high heat. Let preheat 20-30 minutes.

Pat dry any moisture left on the surface of the steak with a towel. Do not rinse the steak.

Turn off the gas burners on one half of the grill. This is your indirect cooking area.

Place the steak over the direct heat on the grill, directly over the high heat burners. Close the door to the grill. When you have nice grill marks, flip the steak. When the surface is nicely seared, you can flip again as needed to brown evenly.

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Cook the steak to an internal temperature of 125ºF, for medium rare. When you’ve achieved all of the color you like on the surface of the steak, move it to the indirect side of the grill to bring the internal temperature to its target temperature, without adding more color.

Rest the steak for 5 minutes before slicing to serve. This allow time for the juices to redistribute.