What is dry aging?
A method of preparation of the meat in which part of the moisture evaporates from the meat, resulting in a fuller taste. In addition to the improvement in taste, there is also an improvement in tenderness. The natural enzymes present in the meat break down the muscle tissue, resulting in the ultimate tender meat.
How can you dry age?
With the Dry aging bags from Drya you can dry-age yourself in your own fridge! These bags ensure a microclimate around the meat. The only thing you have to pay attention to is that the temperature of the cooling stays between 1 and 4 degrees.
What can you Dry-Age?
Beef is most commonly aged, but you could also age Lamb. You have to have a piece of meat with a fair amount of marbling (fat) through it, think of prime rib, cote de boeuf and ribeye. In addition to these known pieces of (more expensive) meat, you can also experiment with other pieces of meat (consult this with your butcher). The fat ensures the taste and tender meat by ripening. If you still want to try and Dry-Age lamb, you have to take into account that you can only dry-age for a maximum of 2 weeks because of the size of the animal it takes less time to get the same effect.
Store after dry aging
When you have reached the desired duration of aging your meat, you can cut the crust off and divide it into steaks. You can then package each steak separately (vacuum). You can keep the steaks in the fridge for up to 3 days. Then you have to put them in the freezer to ensure that the meat does not spoil and then all your time that you have put in has been for nothing. For example, if you want to enjoy a nice dry-aged steak a week later, you have to defrost the dry-aged steak in the fridge for 24 hours. In the freezer you can store the dry-aged steaks for a year, but usually the dry-aged steaks are finished within a few days.