Bem, muitos especialistas em bifes mantiveram por anos que o bife com osso só tem um gosto melhor, algo sobre a medula ser boa.
J. Kenji Lopez-Alt de Grave Come testou essa teoria.
Ele descobriu que os ossos do bife eram impenetráveis demais para a medula realmente dar sabor ao bife grelhado, mas que os ossos forneciam um isolamento benéfico:
To test this, I cooked four identical roasts. The first was cooked with the bone on. For the second, I removed the bone, but tied it back against the meat while cooking. For the third, I removed the bone, and tied it back to the meat with an intervening piece of impermeable heavy-duty aluminum foil. The fourth was cooked completely without the bone.
Tasted side-by-side, the first three were completely indistinguishable from each other. The fourth, on the other hand, was a little tougher in the region where the bone used to be.
What does this indicate? Well, first off, it means the flavor exchange theory is completely bunk—the completely intact piece of meat tasted exactly the same as the one with the intervening aluminum foil. But it also means that the bone does serve at least one important function: it insulates the meat, slowing its cooking, and providing less surface area to lose moisture.
Ele também menciona que o osso fornece uma estrutura para proteger a forma da carne, mas é uma dor para esculpir o osso da carne cozida:
The best way to cook your beef is to detach the bone and tie it back on. You get the same cooking quality of a completely intact roast with the added advantage that once it's cooked, carving is as simple as cutting the string, removing the bones, and slicing.
(A citação diz "assado", mas no artigo ele parece estar falando tanto sobre bife)
Você menciona que o bife com osso custa mais ao açougueiro do que desossado. Eu normalmente não achei que fosse o caso. Quando eu compro carne, o osso tem sido menos caro do que um bife desossado com o mesmo peso de carne, corte e carne. Às vezes, eu pagava um extra pelo tempo do açougueiro, removendo o osso.