Cooking steak right out of the fridge
It can be tempting to grab your steak straight from the fridge and start cooking on a hectic weeknight, but several chefs advise against this, saying that a good steak really shines when it has some time to come to room temperature. When cooking steak, Jamie Oliver advises spending a full hour on the counter because doing it at fridge temperature will prevent the meat from cooking evenly.
Experts agree with the suggestion, including Thomas Godfrey, chef and food operations manager at The Meat & Wine Co. in Sydney, who tells Steak School that cooking a room-temperature steak will not only result in a final product that is more evenly cooked but will also prevent the muscle fibers from tensing up, resulting in a more tender texture all around. Although these are strong arguments, other experts believe that this rule is nothing more than a fable. On his YouTube channel, barbecue guru Hank's True BBQ debunked this myth and advocated the reverse sear technique, which, according to J. Kenji López-Alt of Serious Eats (who also disapproves of bringing steaks to room temperature in a Cooking Light article), involves first cooking the steak in a low oven before browning it over high heat in a "ripping-hot" skillet or on a hot grill.
