Tried wet aging a whole ribeye in my walk-in and lost half of it to trimming

I heard from a guy at the trade show that wet aging a whole primal in the bag for 28 days brings out the best beefy flavor. So I took a 16 pound ribeye I got from a local farmer and let it sit in my walk-in cooler at 34 degrees. I thought I had the temp perfect but after 3 weeks the bag had this weird sour smell when I opened it. Ended up trimming away almost 8 pounds of dark, slimy outer meat and the inside was still kinda off. My mentor said the humidity in my walk-in was too high and the bag wasn't sealed right. Has anyone else messed up a wet age by not checking the bag for leaks every few days?

2 comments

2 Comments

blair_allen8d ago

Man you basically paid $8 a pound for fancy compost. Next time just poke a tiny hole in the bag on purpose, saves you the heartbreak of thinking you screwed up.

reese868d agoMost Upvoted

lol @blair_allen thats actually genius but now im wondering do those little pinhole tears actually let enough air in to stop the slime or do you basically need to gas exchange the whole top of the bag? i tried poking like 3 holes once and it still turned into a science experiment inside