A good piece of steak with a well-chosen condiment is a reason to leave the house. And Australian chefs are excelling at quality beef done well.

Some chefs wander their wine cellars for inspiration, blowing dust off bottles and inspecting the labels to kickstart ideas for the season. Neil Perry browses his meat cellar. “Every week, I go to our ageing room,” he says of the chilled warehouse in suburban Sydney (Warrane) where up to $90,000 worth of beef is hung from hooks and racked on shelves. He’s seeking the perfect additions to the menu at Margaret, the Double Bay restaurant that was recently named second-best steak restaurant in the world, powering Sydney to the title of Best Steak Destination.

“I look to see how the meat is going and harvest different cuts week by week,” says Perry. Whether it’s Wagyu or Friesian, pasture-fed or grain-finished, loin or rib, everything is from trusted producers and deemed ready when it best expresses its true, beefy nature. “We’re looking for the flavour of the beef to come through,” says Perry. “Readiness is about how nice, firm and dry it is: we like it dehydrated enough to give that intensity.”

Each offering is described on Margaret’s daily menu by weight, age, feed, breed, cut and ageing technique so going out “for steak” has turned into going out for wood-grilled 500-gram dry-aged grass-fed 36-months-old Hereford bone-in sirloin. “The Australian diner has become more discerning,” says Perry. “People are eating beef in its natural form and looking for condiments and sides rather than sauces.”

Chef and restaurateur Stacey Conner estimates she’s cooked about 300,000 steaks in an almost 25-year career. “There’s an obsession there,” says the co-owner of Humble on Duke at Sunshine Beach on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, where there’s always a premium steak on the menu. “Sourcing a great product, treating it the best possible way you can, cooking it perfectly for someone, slicing it: I don’t need much more than that as a chef. It’s so satisfying to me.”

Over the decades, she’s seen diners become more adventurous. “We’re having an interesting moment with meat. Before, it was all eye fillets; now there’s tri-tip, skirt, Wagyu crossbreeds and people are happy to pay for quality. They’re more open to different cuts, breeds and cooking methods.” They’re also more informed. “They want to know where their beef is coming from, that it’s been treated well, whether it’s grass or grain. They have more knowledge and they have faith in you as a chef that you’ll care about all that, too.”

In Melbourne (Naarm), hotelier Rabih Yanni also finds his customers are keen to know the beef backstory. “Guests are more engaged, especially on grass versus grain: there’s a lot more awareness around pasture and provenance,” says the owner of Botanical Hotel (above) in South Yarra, who ran his first steak-focused restaurant 20 years ago. Knowing and communicating information about beef is a sign of quality and care. “There isn’t a place worth your time that doesn’t list provenance,” he says. Sharing knowledge builds trust, which then plays into trying new things. “Twenty years ago, more people were asking for their meat well done,” says Yanni. “Now, we have six cuts on the menu, plus two specials, and guests say they’ll have it however the chef recommends. It’s about relationships: ours with the producers and the guests with us.”

More steak specialists to try around the country...