I was a little worried that 36 hrs of marinading in Soy sauce might be too much… But I just left out salt and seasoned with black pepper and garlic powder.
SV for 2:30 hrs @ 135 F
Flavor. 10
Doneness 7 could have been a bit rarer
Tenderness. 8 it was tender, but not super tender
Thinking next time about 3 hrs @ 133 ?
My wife is a firm believer in “extra tender”, and I’ve been serving her steak cooked for 6 hours at 132. Getting lots of “thumbs up” from her! 
Chris, nice work.
And now to make your steaks even better.
Depending on steak thickness that subtle 30-minute increase isn’t going to have much, if any, noticeable impact on a NY Strip’s tenderness. If it’s a thick steak it’s barely up to temperature after 2 1/2 hours and hasn’t really started to tenderize.
135ᴼF isn’t going to result in anything near Rare. That’s the high end of Medium-Rare and can be easily pushed into Medium with aggressive searing.
Tenderness increases with increased cooking temperature, but so does donees.
When making recipe adjustments i usually double a cooking time to obtain a perceptible change in tenderness, up to about 24 hours. Then a 50% increase in time is usually noticeable. It’s the same when making recipe adjustments with seasonings, except with salt. Doubling an amount becomes noticeable.
Less, not very much.
I would consider a much longer cook… But afraid of dryness ? Those 6hr steaks don’t get any dryer ?
Okay, so next time, 5 hrs… But if I wanted it just a little more rare, what temp ? 131 ?
If my cooking time stayed at 2:30hrs, I’d think 133… But for 5hrs… Hmmm…
Oh and BTW, to protect against agressive searing, I actually pulled my steaks out of the SV machine, still in the bag, and threw them into the freezer, right flat on top of some blue ice blocks for a few minutes. And when I pulled them back out, they were barely luke warm. Then, no worries about blasting the heck out of them with my weed torch. Plus, that things gets so hot, I can finish them with an amazing sear in like 60-90 seconds 
Love that torch. Not even thinking about pan searing.
Chris, don’t be afraid, time is the SV cook’s friend.
Dryness results from meat temperature. Meat’s muscle tissues shrink in direct relation to temperature beginning about 100ᴼF and continuing up to about 175ᴼF, - or Pulled Pork territory.
See for yourself.
In your record keeping weigh the meat before cooking. After cooking collect the meat juices in a measuring cup, weigh it if you can. Or just consider a liquid ounce to be an ounce in weight.
Close enough.
Record the percentage of liquid lost at different temperatures in your SV Cooking Log Book.
Over time you will observe at higher cooking temperatures there are greater percentages of fluids collected. Once meat has reached temperature equilibrium little to no more fluids will be forced out of the meat because we also have pressure equilibrium.
How come?
Easy. Think about what’s happening.
As meat cooks the external SV cooking water pressure ( at 1 Atmosphere)) will eventually equal the meat’s stable internal pressure so the fluids are under no pressure to go anywhere and they just hang out and cook in the meat.
That’s the beauty of SV cooking. There isn’t the drying out of meat as it cooks that you experienced with conventional cooking. Oh, that’s except for poaching which is like SV - hold the bag, but moisture loss will still be temperature dependant.
Thank you Chatnoir. Well next time, 5hrs at 132. I’m recording each SV i do, the results, and my probable next tweaks… On each kind of meat that I SV. Would like to get it all dialed in to my personal preferences And I’m doing 2 or 3 SV cooking per week. So give me a little bit, and I think I will have it all completely dialed in
BTW, I could see somebody who has never done SV reading this, and thinking, "Wow ! It must be really tricky ! But we know its really not. I’m really just splitting hairs here. After all, the title of this thread was, “Best NY Strips ever”… and they were really fantastic. I just like the challenge of making them slightly better yet
Chris, like you, Ever-Better is my motto.
Has been for decades.
Maybe your title should have been, “Best NY Strips Yet!”.
SV cooking provides you with precisely controlled cooks.
So precisely how much more rare do you want your steaks?
Just a little, then 132á´ĽF might just be perfect.
Let’s consider doneness being a continuum from Rare to Badly Over Cooked. Imagine a slider on your circulator’s temperature control. Rare is all the way to the left and Medium is all the way to the right.
Further to the right is too horrible to contemplate.
OK, where are you going to set the slider?
132á´ĽF might be right. Your steaks will be little more than Medium-Rare.
Medium-Rare is generally accepted as being 130á´ĽF with that slider in the exact middle. I sense you are a 131á´ĽF or 132á´ĽF steak lover.
And anyone reading your earlier posts who isn’t pursuing culinary excellence stopped reading them at least a day ago.
Keep well.
Yep, I’m thinking 132 might be spot on And I also liked that 2 day marinade in Soy Sauce, with zero salt added. Might put some real butter on top of it too, but on my plate, after the cooking is all done Remember, I’m one of those crazy Keto guys
Soy and fish sauce are both good flavour enhancers for steak. Combined they add a distinctive flavour similar to that of dry-aged beef. Plenty of sodium in both, so there’s no need for salt unless you like a lot. Then use salt when you blast the steaks.
That raw garlic you like can get mixed with the butter too. Whiz the garlic and butter, and a little white wine if you’re allowed some carbs. Plus some freshly ground black pepper and some minced parsley from the pot on your windowsill and you have the Maitre d’Hotel Butter posh steakhouses serve on top of steaks. Switch up the wine for something more distinctive if you like. Maybe a touch of Bourbon?
Hey Frank, the addition of Bourbon sounds interesting! When doing so would you suggest heating the bourbon and getting rid of the alcohol in it prior to adding it to the sous vide bag?
My bad…you were talking toppings! Serves me right for reading and being involved in a conversation simultaneously!
I just watched a video by the SV Everything guys, and a viewer had recommended they cook off the alcohol before using beer. They tried it, and said it was WAAAY better. Plus that way you don’t have nasty alcohol in your food lol (don’t mind me)