Is this too much mold?

[Andrew Nguyen]

I was dry aging a bone-in rib roast but couldn’t get a proper seal and maintain good contact. I should have wet the steak a bit but I learned about that too late. I tried re-sealing the bag several times until I realized it was a lost cause and settled for something that wasn’t airtight and was probably only able to maintain 50% contact, maybe less.

It looked okay for about 3-4 weeks. After about 4 weeks some mold started appearing and I took it out at 5 weeks. No awful or rotten smell, but also no dry age smell either. It almost had zero smell. There seemed to be very little water loss as well.

Some questions:
1) Is the amount of mold seen below okay/safe?
2) Is it not properly aged because of the lack of dry-age smell?
3) Is it not properly aged because of the lack of water loss?
4) Ultimately, is it safe to eat and what kind of flavors should I expect?

[Ron Pratt]

Cut up steaks looks good to me! So how long was it in the UMAi Dry® bag? Your pictures look like meat that was aged commando style. In that case surface mold like yours is common, plus many times there are spores of little green fingers waving at you!
Ron

[Andrew Nguyen]

It was in there the full 5 weeks, just with a lot of air pockets and poor contact. So yeah, I was hoping it might be something like hang drying but hopefully safer because there was at least the UMAI bag as a barrier. But then again, I’m no expert, so wanted to see what the community thinks.

[Ron Pratt]

Well if it was rotten your nose would have known long before you even cut it!
Ron

[Andrew Nguyen]

Thanks, I went ahead and grilled one of them up last night. There was certainly a subtle aged aroma in the mouth, but not as pronounced as my last ribeye which I successfully dry-aged.

Also, it didn’t have that concentrated beefy flavor, I guess due to the lack of water loss. Is this what a wet-aged steak would taste like?

[Ron Pratt]

Yes the lack of water loss certainly attributed to the lack of concentrated beefy flavor! Besides that however it appears you only aged it for 35 days so being the size it was and the bone in besides 35 days is pretty short in my my book!
Ron

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