Why is it so hard to get properly cooked steak in Ireland?

Bobson Dugnutt

The idea that some lad living in a glorified bedsit can cook up a similar quality steak to the likes you would find in a place like Hawksmoor, FX Buckley’s, Featherblade etc is laughable. Getting his IKEA frying pan up to a blistering temperature on the 15 year old ceramic cooker. Air fryer chips. Packet peppercorn sauce. A bottle of Chateau CircleK.

Gatling

I once made a mistake of ordering steak from a well known restaurant on father's Day one year, ordered medium as normal, steak arrived at the table well done ,called the waitress and she's brings it back with a fresh order for a medium rare steak ,20 mins later the second well done steak arrived at the table at this stage everyone else is on dessert, manger then approached is everything all right,no order steak Medium got well done , ordered again this time medium rare,and it too was served well done,one last steak order number 3 and 20 mins later it arrived charred,

It's the only time Ive ever I point blank refused to pay the bill

sprucemoose

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198694#Comment_121198694

i mean fair enough, thats a bit of a different story unfirtunately

Gatling

@[Deleted User] how often would you order a medium pork chop , don't think I've ever heard anyone asking for it before

SuperBowserWorld

Christ, the amount of meat being returned and wasted on this thread cause someone's steak wasn't quite right. And people starving in the world, farm animals being tortured and environments destroyed.

First World Problem.

Also, I've had lots of lovely steak in Ireland.

😁

Yeah Right

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198416#Comment_121198416

In a perfect world, maybe...... But, That's all dependant upon the time taken to report it.

How often does someone report a restaurant for food poisoning that same night? And you're saying they'd be straight out to the restaurant, next day, no matter what? I call BS.

What if it takes a day or two to get over the illness? Or if the place is closed for a few days etc.

What if the meat is all gone by then, or if its impossible to tell which side of meat the steak came from?

And what if it wasn't the meat itself, it was the cooking process? Cross contamination from other raw products?

Or undercooked chicken, for example? What good is looking at the other chicken breasts if the one you got wasn't cooked properly? It's not just dodgy ingredients that can give you food poisoning.

Plenty of reasons why "checking the same meat" could be meaningless.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198739#Comment_121198739

Whenever I order pork honestly. You can eat it mid rare but I don’t really like it myself.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198748#Comment_121198748

Okay, you can argue the pointlessness all you want I’m simply telling you what EHO procedures are in these cases.

as for how long after eating it’s reported, I’m not exactly sure why someone would suspect they got food poisoning yesterday but report it in a few weeks..?

regardless, when they come & come they certainly will, they will check all relevant records, documents & products in the kitchen. They’ll usually inspect dining areas and any staff areas as well (changing rooms etc).

I dont think you quite understand exactly how well documented every movement in a professional kitchen is? Everything from the temperature of fridges & freezers, to the batch codes from deliveries is logged.

If the EHO arrive for inspection on the back of a reported food poisoning and you can’t provide these things then you have some serious explaining to do.

Lewis_Benson

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198353#Comment_121198353

Not joking at all.

If prepared correctly, a beef burger can be cooked medium or medium rare.

Yeah Right

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198605#Comment_121198605

Sounds like your local takeaways are crap.

Every takeaway curry I've ever seen has at least onions in them, unless they were requested to be removed. Most have had mushrooms or another type of veg included also.

My local Chinese looks like a dump but their Thai green curry has 8 different types of veg in it (mushroom onion pepper broccoli peas bamboo shoots mangetout and chillies) and that's without including garlic or ginger or lemongrass etc. They also have what I suspect are fresh kaffir lime leaves also, but they won't confirm that as they're illegal in the EU, AFAIK.

Hardly extravagant, at €9 including rice. The red curry has lotus root in it, which qualifies I suppose. That's before we get into their other dishes..... Proper szechuan, kung po, hot garlic, black bean.....theres plenty of variety and veggies available if you want to look.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198353#Comment_121198353

Burgers are fine to eat medium. They must be stored at below 5c at all times prior to cooking though!

in fact if mince is stored in the fridge you can eat it raw! How do you think steak tar tar works? ;)

also you need to mince the beef fresh. If you mince beef today & make burgers on Sunday, please cook them well done. 😂

Gatling

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198782#Comment_121198782

Anytime Ive been over in the states order burgers and they usually serve them Medium, first time I had one it raised an eyebrow but as someone who likes beef medium to medium rare it's no biggie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198795#Comment_121198795

mate are you just on this thread to argue about everything I say 😂

nachouser

Expect to see the banned op back with a thread claiming they can't get an authentic Irish breakfast anywhere anymore.

Rubberchikken

We ldo our steaks at home on the bbq. Works perfectly. Meat from our local butcher if that has any bearing. I don't buy meat in the supermarkets just have always gone to this shop. Habit I guess. But the quality is great and always tasty😋.

Did a t bone and a rib eye the other day. Both spot on.

Having said that I never order steak out. A bit too overpriced for my liking.

dxhound2005

If this thread was on the Food forum, it would be closed down.

Food forum Mod: Seriously, I'm (metaphorically) blue in the face from repeating this - we absolutely, totally forbid food safety advice to be sought or given on this forum. Please read the charter!

Yeah Right

@[Deleted User] I'm commenting on what you're posting, that's it. Plenty of people are too busy on the toilet bowl to be ringing the FSAI. You make it sound like they're batman, waiting for the signal in the sky. Are they available to take calls on a bank holiday Sunday at 6pm? Or 11pm? No, course not, so there's plenty of scope where it could go unreported for a few days.

You said they'll check the same meat as the customer ate. There's no way that is possible in every instance, and no way is it even relevant in every instance either. I'm curious as to how they'd do it, so I asked. Your answers are full of holes, so require further elaboration. The type of 'professional' kitchen that makes customers sick probably isn't going to be too pressed when it comes to recording everything or too trustworthy when it comes to

You accused someone else of going to shite restaurants earlier, then you say in the next breath that your curries are just meat and sauce. I've never seen a curry with no veg in it, ever, except a katsu curry which is supposed to be like that. You must be going to the worst Chinese in the country, so.

If you're going to take offense at the someone pointing out this duplicitousness, maybe you shouldn't be throwing shade like you did.

Edit: for someone who works in a decent restaurant, it seems a bit weird that you're calling onions in a curry "the extravagant"

ELM327

Proper steak should be eaten blue, not rare or medium or any of that nonsense. I was on holiday in france this summer and had excellent steak tartare, that's peak steak. Very difficult to get a good steak in Ireland, to the point I rarely order it anymore.

The only exception to the above blue steak is potentially a nice cut of filet or waygu could be had rare instead of blue. Blue covers a lot of sirloin, striploin etc.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198859#Comment_121198859

You can report it online, believe it or not.

Look man if you think it’s a big job to report food poisoning just go to their website (fsai.ie) and check for yourself. It can literally be done in 5 mins.

Your local HSE office will have environmental health officers whom they will dispatch as required to investigate reports and of course they’re around all the time popping in for spot checks and unannounced visits.

I appreciate you are skeptical about this, but this is easily researched if you want to learn more, I’m not going to spend all day teaching you about FSAI, I had to go to college for that.

As for the rest, if the kitchen is not following proper procedures they will be found out in that case and suffer the consequences. If you want to see what those tend to be again the FSAI website is full of information in regards their enforcement orders, closure orders, etc etc.

You could also ring them and discuss these things if you want, I’m dying sick so if I’m missing some details forgive me.

in any case I’m just a chef, if you want to talk about the FSAI and their work talk to them. 😎

one thing I will say about them and I really mean it they are very proud of the work they do & I am delighted our laws are so strict. It’s often why suspected “food poisoning” is more often you drank too much…

anyway as for the curry, Jesus you’re still on that, but anyway look man if every Chinese & chipper you go to has veg in their curries I’m happy for you. Really I am. You must be very proud too. Any pictures?

like Jesus man give it a rest.

@Yeah Right

@Yeah Right

if you have a half hour to spare this video will give you a much better insight into how EHO inspections work.

i don’t remember if it details the process In the event of food poisoning report though which it seems you are especially interested

edit: link would be handy…

https://youtu.be/4YG60NQNfcI?si=GVMhgp4YIBLcugM_

gameoverdude

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198936#Comment_121198936

Do they investigate amazing thread deletions about proper toasties?

Yeah Right

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198891#Comment_121198891

Thanks for the info. I still find it implausible that they're able to respond to every accusation within 24 hrs like you claimed. I doubt they're all even reported in that time period also, but you've never even properly addressed those points, so we'll leave it there so, no point flogging a dead horse.

As for the curry, you have avoided those questions expertly twice now as well, so we can let that one go too.

Bit weird to ask someone for pics, though, then tell them to give it a rest. But hey, if you don't want someone addressing what you've said, maybe don't say it in the first place. This is a forum, after all.

Yeah Right

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198936#Comment_121198936

If it doesn't cover the specific point I asked about, not much point in looking at it, but thanks for the effort at least.

listermint

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121198866#Comment_121198866

Tbf,

Blue steak is disgusting. Next thing after getting a graw for blue steak is cannibalism.

I think people order blue to wind other people up rather than for a love of it.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121199024#Comment_121199024

You can find it implausible if you wish, in my experience the reports are followed up on within a day or two at worst.

As I said when a report is made to the FSAI and passed then to an EH officer in the HSE.

I imagine it would depend on how busy the individual officers in the area are at the time however a complaint of food poisoning would be regarded as urgent follow up.

you can rest assured in any case it would not take 3 weeks.

mariaalice

In a fit of madness, I went to the Hawksmoor the steak was really good and it's cooked exactly as the customer wanted. I wouldn't go back though as I consider it nice but not spectacular and at the price they charge it needs to be spectacular.

I don't get ordering steak in a restaurant normally, for me eating out is about the skill of the chef and trying something you wouldn't eat at home because it's a hassle to cook at home.

ELM327

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121199068#Comment_121199068

It tastes completely different to raw steak. Steak tartare is raw steak mince, so I know what raw steak actually tastes like!

listermint

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121199139#Comment_121199139

Like people Elm. Like People 😁

Xander10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121196980#Comment_121196980

The mother in law does a grey steak or a pork chop you'd struggle to cut

But of an Irish thing with older generation

Solution - steak on a stone! You cook it yourself at the table. Have had it in Madeira where it’s popular, also had it regularly on a cruise last year, absolutely fantastic thing, you have it just as you want, and can put it back on stone a little longer if not cooked enough to your liking. 🥩🥩🥩🥩🥩🥩🥩🥩🥩🥩