Grant Crilly is the Executive Director and cofounder of ChefSteps. Grant is a classically trained chef and, prior to ChefSteps, he worked on the award-winning cookbook series Modernist Cuisine and cooked at various restaurants, including L’Astrance in Paris, Busaba in Mumbai, and Mistral Kitchen in Seattle.

Grant Crilly

The New York strip is a classic steak: easy to find, easy to cook, and easy to eat—the Goldilocks steak. For this classic cut, we chose a classic cooking technique: a pan sear with a butter-baste finish. The high heat sear kickstarts surface browning, and the butter baste gradually brings the internal temperature up while fortifying the browning created by the sear, so you get a beautiful, burnished crust and a juicy, tender interior.However, before all that happens, we do a little precook trim of the strip. We trim away the tough nerve that lies just beneath the fat cap (which we have to take off in the process as well), for a more tender eating experience. Don’t worry, though: We give you the option of cooking up the fat cap into golden delicious nuggets with the steak so you can still chew the fat, along with your perfectly tender steak.

Butter-Basted New York Strip Steak