first time dry aging 40 days! need help!

[Pedro Afonso]

after 40 days of dry aging in regular fridge, in the last days i noticed a weird smell in the fridge but not too intense. after this discovered that the seal was totally broken in the foam part and the meat near the opening was moist and had some liquid in.

immediately tough it was ruined, but after cutting it open and trimming “bad parts” the steak smell normal and meat looks pretty ok. the umai membrane was stick to meat except on those parts that were mosty and squishy.
i use a regular fridge rack where we use for daily usage. after the entire process i have several questions.

-i follow many guides online on how to seal off but cant tell why double seal on the foam totally broke, why did it broke?
-after trimming out the suspicious “bad Parts” is it safe to eat the rest of the piece or i should just throw it all away?

i also noticed that i wrongly put the fat cap in the bottom side and not on top. could this be also the reason to accumulate moist in on top?

all tips and corrections are more than appreciated! thanks!

[Ron Pratt]

Let’s cut to the chase first…yes after trimming off the tainted part then the meat is fine.

As for why it happened my guess is the seal was no good in the first place! As for it still having juice after 40 days I wonder about your refrigerator…is it a frost free unit? The amount of moisture you said makes me believe the frig is an older model.
Ron

[Pedro Afonso]

my refrigerator is 12 years old, its combo freezer and refrigerator(split not in the same door) since there is Ice formation in the freezer i believe its not frost free. the refrigerator has a small vent on the top but some moist accumulate in the back of it (there are some small water drops all the time). could the moist be also the reason to “destroy” the seal?

this mean that the results of dry age in this condition does not worth?
thanks for you reply! so fast and helpful!

[Ron Pratt]

No – the seal was not a good one to start with so in the future you might want to try the straw/tubing method which involves a bread twisty for closure.

Since your refrigerator is not frost free then the moisture being extracted during the aging process had nowhere to go. The meat did age, but not well.
Ron

[Thea]

The fridge must have frost free function to manage the cups and cups of water the meat needs to release to dry age properly.

For sealing, seal twice in each location (main and back up). Gently do a tug test on each after cooling.

To skip vacuum sealer, check out this new video: https://youtu.be/K9B7pozroe8

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