- Is Wagyu steak really that much better than Choice or Prime? In this video I'm grilling three steaks from Snake River Farms to find out. I think you'll be
surprised by the results. Stick around, see how they turned out. (upbeat music) Okay, let's jump right in. This is a $35 USDA Choice Ribeye steak from Double R Ranch in Washington, owned and operated by our
friends at Snake River Farms. It's a nice looking steak. This is a $42 USDA Prime Ribeye, also from Double R Ranch. As you can see, it's
got a lot more marbling and it's cut a little thicker. Pretty good for a steak
that only cost 20% more than the Choice. And this is an $89 American
Wagyu Gold Grade Ribeye steak from Snake River Farms. Oh boy, the marbling is incredible, but is it worth more than double the price of the Prime Ribeye? I'm going to make these three
steaks exactly the same way. How will they compare? Let's get started and find out. Let's get these trimmed up. One of the things I like
about Snake River Farms is that they do a really good job of trimming steaks before they send them. Even this Choice steak
only has a little edge fat. There's not a lot of
marbling on this steak. So I'm going to leave the edge fat as is to hopefully get a little
extra flavor in there when we cook it. The Prime steak also only
has a little extra edge fat. I'm going to take some of this off because it's got good marbling, but I'm going to leave
the fat that connects the eye and the cap, just so
we can keep that rounded shape and get good, even smoke
coverage on the grill. For the Wagyu steak, I'm going
to be a little more aggressive about getting all the edge fat off. There's plenty of intramuscular fat, so I want to get the meat exposed directly to the rub and the smoke. I'm also going to trim off
this little piece of meat that's cut unevenly along the edge. It won't cook evenly with the steak, so it's better just to get it off now than to have over cooked meat on the steak when we serve it. Okay, let's get these on a rack so we can get some salt on them. As you know from my other steak videos, I believe in dry brining every steak, at least for a few hours,
but preferably overnight. I'm going to get a good cover of salt on each of these steaks. The salt is going to
pull the excess moisture to the surface where
some of it will evaporate and the rest will pull the salt back into the meat where it
will help to retain moisture when we get these on the grill tomorrow. I'm going to leave these
uncovered in the fridge overnight to get the maximum effect. But with the miracle of video editing, you don't have to wait. Boom (explosion), we're back,
and it's already tomorrow! As you can see the meat
on all three steaks has darkened a bit, and so much moisture has come out that the
meat has shrunk a little as compared to the fat. If you've ever needed proof
that spices absorb better into meat than fat, notice that the fat hasn't absorbed the salt. You're not wasting your
time putting dry rub on the fat caps of your
butts and briskets, but the real flavor gets
absorbed by the meat. Speaking of dry rubs, let's get some spice onto these steaks. We dried out the surfaces
when we dry brined them, so we'll need a binder
to hold the spices on. My favorite binder for
steak is of course tallow that I make from the fat I trim from Wagyu steaks and briskets. Super fans Christopher
and Steve left comments last week on the Tomahawk steak video asking me to show how I make it, so look for a video soon on that. So for these steaks, we
really want to taste the beef, so I'm just going to use a
little bit of pepper and garlic. We don't need to add more salt. In fact, we don't want to, because the salt from the dry brine has already been absorbed into the meat. Let's get these cooking. I'll meet you at the grill. (rock music) This is Darth, our extra
large Big Green Egg. He's running at 225 degrees Fahrenheit, burning Fogo Premium
Hardwood Lump Charcoal, chunks of Cherrywood that'll
enhance the flavor of the beef. I'm going to be using a technique today called a reverse sear. First, I'm going to
smoke these low and slow until they reach about 120
degrees internal temperature, 10 or 15 degrees below
our target, medium rare. Then I'll sear them the rest of the way. I'll put temperature probes right into the middle of each steak,
so I'll know exactly when each one is done. (timer dinging) It's been about 40
minutes and it looks like the Choice steak is ready
to come off the smoker. I'll pull this one, wrap it in foil and put it in this cooler to stay warm. It looks like the other ones
still have a ways to go, so we'll come back for
them in about 10 minutes. (timer dinging) Okay, it looks like the other
two are about done here. So let's wrap them up and let them rest while I get the Egg ready
for direct grilling. I'll be using these grill grates that are cut to match the Egg perfectly. These will spread the heat
and control the drippings. I'm going to get these really hot, about 800 degrees Fahrenheit or so. Then I'll put some avocado oil on and sear these Ribeyes to perfection. Let's do this! (steaks sizzling) (upbeat music) Hey, Leah, I made three steaks. - Yeah? - And there are different. - How? - Well let's see if you can guess. I'm going to give us a taste of each and you tell me what
you think of each one. All right? All right, let's start with this one. And this time I'm going to cut
these into bite sized pieces. So, all right. So there's one piece
here for you, one for me, and then one for you, and then one for you at the camera okay? All right, are we ready? Cheers.
- Cheers. Cheers.
- Cheers. Wow!
- That's pretty good, right? - That's really good! Which one was that? Which one did we
- That was this one. - Okay. - What do you think? Flavor? - Mm. - Tender? - Mm mm. - Just a little tender?
- Yeah. - Or that's it, or did
you think it was tough? - No, it's a little tender. - Okay.
- But I don't think the flavors awesome,
- Okay. - but I think it is pretty good. - Okay, you would eat that one for dinner? - [Leah] Yeah, I would. - [Al] Okay, let's try this one. - [Leah] And I don't think
that's bad for you to eat. - [Al] All right, let's cut
a couple of pieces here. All right.
- So that one's this one? - This is the middle one. All right, this piece is for you, this is for you at the camera. And which one you want? Okay, Cheers, Cheers! - I like the other one better. - Yeah, you like this one? Yeah, this one, it's maybe
a little bit more tender, - Mmhmm. - but the flavor's more
concentrated on this one, right? - Okay, yeah. - Okay, all right, ready
to try the last one? - Yeah.
- Okay. - I wonder what it's going to taste like? - Do you think it's going
to be the best or the worst? - I dunno, we haven't tried it.
- Okay, let's find out. This is a nice big piece. Whoops, bite size enough for you? - Yeah.
- All right, Oh, you want this one? Okay, and this one's for you. All right, ready? Cheers, cheers.
- Cheers, cheers. Wow, that tastes amazing! - So one of these is Prime,
and one of these is Choice, and one of these is Wagyu,
which one do you think is Wagyu? - That one.
- Yeah, you're right. Definitely. So this one over here was Choice, which you said had a little
bit more flavor, right? - And this one was probably Prime. - This one was Prime, a
little bit more tender, not as much flavor. - I like the Wagyu and the Choice. I didn't like the Prime as much. - Okay, well the Choice one was thin, I wonder if maybe it's the
thin cuts that you like? I definitely, I think I'm eating this one. I'm going to stick with the Wagyu. You're you're just all over the place. You just like the steak, right? So great, so hope you guys
enjoyed this comparison. Didn't turn out exactly the way we felt. I mean, obviously the Wagyu was the best, surprised that the Choice
came in as a contender, so good for the Choice. You guys can do your own test at home and see what you think. In the meantime, if you like this video, check out this video right here, it's a rib battle and it's a lot of fun. This one here is also pretty good. And if you're not a subscriber, this would be a great time to click that subscribe button
before the video ends. We will see you next
week on Eat More Vegans.
