Hi, first time to cooked a 2” porterhouse steak. I did it for 2 hours at 135 F. But the meat did not come out as tender as I like. Any suggestions? I bought my steak at a grocery store so I dont know if freshness is factor in this case. Any tips/suggestion is appreciated!!
What ‘doneness’ were you aiming for? And what grade was the steak. Freshness wouldn’t be a factor in tenderness, but age of beast might. There really are a lot of variables at play.
Hi Ember,
Medium. Haha so if it’s like frozen for months the meat wont be as tender even if it is cooked throught sous vide?
Freezing probably would not have too much to do with it. If anything, it probably would have helped with the tenderness sure to the water rupturing cell membranes. As @Ember asked, what grade meat was this? Was it grass fed/free range/commodity-factory farm/etc? The more information you can give about the piece of meat, the more likely it is folks will be able to help you.
When I say age of the beast I mean before it was slaughtered, not after. 
One thing I’ll throw out there is that 2 hours isn’t long enough for a 2" thick steak. You should look at the time/thickness charts online (the ones on Douglas Baldwin’s site are quite good).
I say you normally need to add an hour on top of what’s recommended if you want the sous vide to tenderize your meat (or, hell, maybe double it?)
Also, if you haven’t read the Food Lab’s sous vide steak guide, you definitely should - gives a very good explanation of the various cooking times and tenderness achieved.
I’m actually doing an outside round roast for 3 days at the moment…should be tender as butter (I’m hoping!!)
If meat is not aged I think you have to cook it for longer time to get the same tenderness as with aged meat, so that the collagen transforms in gelatin.
Thanks! I’ll probably try Baldwin’s chart. Hopefully it works.
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I always find that if the meat isn’t top quality, it needs a lot longer to get tender. In fact it’s the aspect of sous vide cooking that appeals to me the most. Buying a cheaper cut and getting great results, but with much longer cooking. Experiment and keep notes.