Get a couple of 3/4" thick Flat Irons and generously rub both sides with your favorite seasoning, using 1/4 tsp. of salt per steak if your seasoning has no salt in it. Let them stand at room temp for 10 to 15 minutes. Heat a skillet (I use a heavy, high-quality nonstick) over medium to medium-high heat. Add a little oil, fry the steaks for 5 minutes on each side, flipping only once (tongs - no fork.) Take pan off heat and let rest for 5 minutes. They'll be tender, juicy, bursting with flavor . . . guaranteed.

I also tend to like just salt and pepper, as good beef usually doesn't need "help", in my opinion. Elery does like the Montreal Steak Seasoning, so we use that sometimes. I like my beef extremely rare, and I grow my own so I'm comfortable eating it that way. I've been know to eat it raw, even. (shrug) I figure Steak Tartare and Carpaccio are both raw beef, so it's all good. I never grill. I like grilled food, but not enough to ever grill it, I just dislike the entire process. Instead I get a cast iron pan screaming hot, toss the steak in there, turn it when I get a nice sear, get a sear on the second side, take it out. I'm done. My favorite steak is sirloin. It's not as tender but has so much flavor and I figure that's why I have teeth! Annie

I'm late to this party, but I have to say, such easily cleaned surfaces as granite and stainless steel would not prevent me from cooking, though if I were tired, I might just wipe up visible residue with a sponge and do a proper cleaning the next day (or have a helper do it). The exception is eggplants. One of my reasons for getting a small gas top to go with my induction was for charring eggplants, but stainless is not as easy to clean as enamel, and the grate is really heavy, so I have a tendency to stick eggplants in the broiler on a pyroceram pie plate that goes in the dishwasher, instead. But if the oven were otherwise engaged, I'd use the gas flames. The kitchen that came with the house was horrible to cook in. The stove and fridge were a hike apart. The dishwasher was a few steps away from the sink. The kitchen was a G shape within a room, trapping the cook, or forcing a '60's spy movie leap over the peninsula. I spent a long time designing and implementing my current kitchen, which is a U with umlaut, and has cabinetry instead of blank walls. Things are spaced right and there's good work flow. The main single cook working zone ("triangle" +) is compact and efficient, but I've also had six cooks and various schmoozers in there comfortably. If your kitchen is bugging you so much, you might seriously consider a remodel. If the cabinets are in good shape, you might be able to reuse them, and might even be able to recut the granite. Get induction! You could put paper (newspaper, paper towels, parchment, butcher paper) all over your spatter area and just roll up the mess and put it away. If that's not in the cards, get a high powered portable induction unit that will put out enough power for your sears, and put that on the paper, or perhaps a piece of Formica (i.e., plastic) skin that's easy to wash and store with the baking boards. Even as it stands now, you can make an apron for your gas cooktop out of something like Masonite covered with stainless steel. Make a flat piece to cover the counter all around it for the space the spatter reaches, and hide it in the garage or something unless you're searing. You can even get fancy and make a backsplash of sorts to stand up, or perhaps even adapt a wind protector from an outdoor grill. Having a protector that you can just dump in the sink to wash or hose off the next day is far superior to avoiding the cooking!! Embrace your kitchen! Allow it to serve you. Do whatever you need to to keep it from bugging you.

I'm not sure I can answer the sloppy joe kind of gal question. There are as many different flavors to it as there are to burgers. I've always loved them. My mother would sometimes make me sloppy joe instead of the burgers she was making for the family, just to be nice. I haven't figured out how to replicate her recipe and she doesn't even remember doing it. I know that the dregs of the ketchup bottle and wine to get it out with were involved... Re satisfaction, I like 'em, so find them satisfying. Maybe figure out why you're unsatisfied? First off, are you eating enough? Sloppy joe started as a way to extend meat, because you can fill the bun with less and not have it seem so meager. It's hard to pile high. I often make them open face on thick homemade whole grain bread, meant to eat with a knife and fork and a good third of a pound per. Or I'll use One Buns, which are sliced flat buns, same diameter, but thin, so both pieces together are worth one slice of bread, and make portions of two per person, with a more usual amount of filling. If it's not the portion of meat, is it the flavor/seasoning/meatiness? Or not getting enough of a chew on to stimulate your alimentary system? (If the last, maybe serve with crunchy raw vegetables?) I also had a hard time figuring it out and tried a bunch of recipes before finding something that suited me enough to use it as a starting point. It calls for a lot of sauce. Basically, a cup of condiments (ketchup, mustard, barbecue sauce (the kind that's good on french fries, not the kind that has to caramelize on the meat), etc.). Pick your poison. That's to more or less 1.25 lb. of meat. Now that I have it down, I don't use nearly that much, and I just squirt. In this, however, is my liking for hamburgers with ketchup and yellow mustard on them, so ketchup and mustard sloppy joes is fine with me. You could use soy sauce and wasabi, though obviously in different proportion. I've used adobo and Mexican pepper sauce. Whatever you use, just make sure to make it strong. I guess that's the most important thing. With loose ground beef, especially (since Amazon, I can't get the good ground bison I prefer), you need to up the flavor to match the exposure of surfaces. If you're using something strong, add water or stock or beer or wine to make enough volume of sauce (back to that one cup thing). Remember that half the joy of sloppy joes is the sauce soaking into the bread (and the misery when it's too greasy is the sauce soaking through the bread and making a gross mess). It also requires courage with the salt for the same reason, and basic generosity with all seasonings and flavorings. So, this is what I do: I start with very lean meat. Greasy sloppy joes are icky where on a grilled burger you might want that fat basting it. I used to have to drain the meat on paper towels. With less than 10% fat, I don't have to. My other "secret" is dried vegetables. I've made sloppy joes with proper chopped onions, peppers, etc., but they have to be sautéed and dried out enough not to screw up the sauce. With not draining the meat, I have the bit of fat and water it sheds, which rehydrates the dried veg. Sloppy joes are for not actually bothering to cook something, IMHO. That meat could be meatballs, or meat loaf, or pirouski, or whatever. Sloppy joes are throw it in a pan and turn it into a sandwich, without even stopping to form it into a burger. I use a generous handful each of It's Delish dehydrated chopped onions, mixed vegetable, and parsley, and sometimes some dried chopped jalapeños from Penzey's. Other times, I'll use some spicy barbecue sauce. Brown the meat, add S&P and the dried veg. Add generous squirts of ketchup and mustard. Adjust flavoring. Toast or steam bread/bun, or if really really lazy, make sandwich and zap for half a minute to steam the bun with the steam from the filling. If not feeling lazy, add sliced tomato, pickle chips, or whatever moves you. Mixed baby lettuces are particularly good with hotdogs and sloppy joes but they must be at least room temperature. Lightly steamed just until barely softened is better, but not a lazy thing to do. So...do you think now that you just don't like 'em?