Grilling For All Reasons

One of the issues facing all grillers is how do you tell when your food is cooked to the desired (or required) doneness?  The most common way is to use an instant read thermometer.   But you risk losing precious juices when you insert/remove the thermometer probe even though many will tell you it’s “only a small hole”, especially if you’re checking 3, 4, or more times.  Most professional chefs have developed the ability to tell how done the meat, poultry, or fish they’re preparing is by simply pressing on it with their fingers.   But for us laymen, could we also learn to do this?

Steven Raichlen, often called the American Grillmaster and a mentor of ours here at Grilling For All Reasons, uses his signature “poke” test.  This is the technique used by professional chefs, but Steven has come up with a great way for those of us less skilled to learn what it feels like, for example, to tell when a steak is cooked to medium-rare.  In this video, Steven demonstrates how to determine what respective levels of doneness feel like, simply by using your hand as a comparison tool.