The Beef...
Here at Longcroft and Old we are extremely proud of our special partnership with AK Stoddart of Edinburgh, who we have worked with for several decades.
All our dry aged beef is hand selected by them for us. The selected cuts have a minimum grading of R4L, a maximum selection of marbling, and the perfect amount of fat cover all over. In short, it is the very finest Scotch PGI beef selected for us.
The Science...
Once the meat is selected and carefully placed into our dry ageing fridge, the enzymes which are naturally found in the beef start working their magic by breaking down the protein and fat strands inside, making the beef more tender and succulent, this process will last for the first 10-18 days.
Now the beef sits and ages, very slowly dehydrating, creating crusts around the cut of beef, once this process has been active for 28days, the final product has unrivalled texture and flavour which simply is amazing!
Our dry ageing fridge…
To have a perfect and precise ageing process, it consists of 5 main components, humidity, temperature, airflow, UV lighting and the correct beef. The humidity is set to 85% which therefore allows all our beef to age without mould growth, but in the same instance not too low as it would dry out the beef too quickly.
Our dry age fridge is set to a constant temperature 0-1c which is critical to slow down or even stop the rotting process. We have recently had 3 high velocity fans fitted, which create a fierce airflow around the room and at the same time conditioning the meat. The UV lighting is a must, it's an important part of the ageing process as it kills any airborne bacteria in the room.