See Where New York City's Top Restaurants Get Their Dry-Aged Beef
DeBragga operates out of a massive warehouse in Jersey City, NJ. Their employees arrive at 2 AM and work until 1 PM every day to ensure that steaks are shipped out on time each morning.
All of the meat comes in and out via the loading dock just outside these doors at the back of the warehouse. It's where raw, uncut pieces of meat comes in, and packaged, processed meat goes out.
The enormous pieces of meat wait under wraps until they can be processed. Each piece that comes into DeBragga has the prestigious "Certified Angus Beef" stamp, indicating high quality.
DeBragga has several massive freezers that they use for storing meat, both when it arrives and before it is sent out to customers.
The dry-aging rooms at DeBragga are separate from the rest of the facility and carefully monitored. No cardboard is allowed in these rooms — the distinct smell of cardboard could affect the flavor of the meat.
The dry-aging rooms smell woody, clean and delicious. Cuts of meat that arrive are quickly sliced, labeled by date, and sent to one of the enormous dry-aging rooms to hang for predetermined periods of time.
Standing fans, aided by massive evaporators and air conditioners, help to keep the rooms freezing cold and free of humidity.
The meat looks (and smells) unbelievable.
This meat had only been dry-aging for a few days - it was very pink and tender to the touch.
By contrast, this meat was several weeks old, felt firmer, and was probably more flavorful. Much of the meat at DeBragga ages for 30 days or more.
This particular cut of meat had been aging at DeBragga since April 4th, making it one of the oldest pieces in the entire facility, and also one of the most expensive: a piece like this could sell for tens of thousands of dollars.
Here you can see enormous pieces of meat at various stages of dry-aging. The meat on the far left is just a day old, while the meat on the far right is nearly 60 days old.
On the left you can see a traditional wet-aged steak. Compare its color to that of the dry-aged steak on the right (both steaks have been aged for the same amount of time). Dry-aged beef tends to taste much more savory, as the loss of humidity concentrates the unique flavor of the meat.
In this room, steaks are cut down, packaged, boxed, and carried out to trucks to be sent all over the country.
The larger pieces of meat are purchased by restaurants like Tao, while these smaller steaks are packaged, printed with DeBragga's logo, and sent out to supermarkets or happy customers who ordered them online.
Now learn to make the ultimate steak.
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