You won't get a smoke flavor cooking on a cast iron grill, but you won't get a smoke flavor on a gas grill either unless you add wood chips to the grill. I have two cast iron grills - one with wide grills and one with narrow. I use the wide one for grilling swordfish steaks and the narrow one for vegetables, such as zucchini. Martha Stewart uses cast iron grills to cook steaks, but I do not cook steaks, and so I cannot speak for the results.

We rarely cook steaks or chops OUTSIDE anymore! We use the restaurant method -- a cast iron skillet smoking hot, put in the meat and sear well on both sides and into a 400 oven until desired doneness. (Look on the internet to find out how long for each type -- it's not too terribly long) They are perfect! DH likes them better than grilled steaks!

A grill pan or a fry pan works great......but you do have to deal with the smoke adn spatters inside. But it works!!

FWIW I broil steaks when it's too hot to cook outside - which it often is here! A bit faster & less messy than the cooktop. Just a lot of salt & pepper is all that's need for good meats.

I love my Staub Dutch oven, so I would probably love the grill. I also have the Demeyere Plancha but hadn't thought of using it for steak! Hmm . . . Thanks, all!

Back in the time before nearly everyone grilled outside, Mom cooked steaks under the broiler for her Okeefe & Merritt stove.

I use the broiler as well. My electric oven has a very good broiler. Rather than a standard broiler pan, I generally use a cast iron grill plate. Don't do that if you like med-rare, because it'll cook too fast, but it's great for medium and more.

Martha's sear and oven is great for if your broiler isn't up to it. (It's definitely a chefy method, but restaurants that serve a lot of steaks usually use salamanders, which are separate, high heat broilers.)

If you have smoked salt, I would use a bit of that as a rub on the steaks and then use any of the methods mentioned above. My personal favorite to add a bit of smokiness to a steak is to use smoked salt and chipotle powder. It would not be the same as a grilled steak of course, but it is pretty darn good.

Has anyone had any luck cooking steaks or chops on a cast iron grill pan on the stove top?

We do that all the time. More often than not, we use a cast iron skillet

Make sure you use a splatter screen.

And the meat doesn't get all those carcinogens that they warn us about when we grill meat

Momj47, really, the carcinogens go away if you grill meat indoors on cast iron? You mean to tell me I have one less thing to feel guilty about in the kitchen? Because I grill more meat on a cast iron grill pan on the cooktop than I care to admit.

Um...the ones from charring meat are still there. There's a transformation at high heat. But you lose the ones added by the smoke from using solid fuel.

@MizLizzie -- the downside of using the Plancha is that it will require some BKF to cleanup afterwards. But if you are doing meat for a crowd it can save time over multiple skillets.

Bummer, I had a feeling the trouble was with the char and not just the fuel source. It appears marinating meat prior to grilling helps reduce carcinogens, though. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/19241593

A few thoughts:

1. Charring adds a little flavor, but not much. It is mostly for appearance. Consider grill marked steaks, the charred area can be less than 10%. of the surface, compared to seared on a pan, which is almost 100%. When in a hurry, you can even char only one side of the steak. Few people look at the other side.

2. Few people can tell you that that you used Liquid Smoke.

3. Searing on a pan - Don't oil the pan, oil the steak. You can get the pan red hot with no smoke.

4. Splatter screen only traps big oil drops. Fine oil mist goes thru. If you are following recipe timing, make sure you are adjusting the timing, because the screen traps steam and you are steaming also.

dcarch

Momj47, really, the carcinogens go away if you grill meat indoors on cast iron?

Probably not

Chemicals in Meat Cooked at High Temperatures and Cancer Risk

Add me to the list of people who cook steak inside on screaming hot cast iron. I raise grass fed beef, so I probably eat more beef than many others, and I do not grill. Ever. I just hate the entire process. I like the result, but not enough to make me consider doing it.

tishtosh has a good idea with the smoked salt, that also works for me, although I've also been known to use a bit of smoked paprika. I also like it seasoned with butter, Worchestershire and Montreal Steak Seasoning. Yeah, weird combo, I know. And I want it so rare my girls used to tell me it was just warm/raw. My old Griswold is deep, and so contains some of the spatters, and because I like it so rare, I don't put it in the oven afterward, although I've done that for guests.

Annie

Alton Brown's recipe is pretty foolproof and is exactly what a few people have said above.

http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/pan-seared-rib-eye-recipe-2131274

The Alton Brown recipe is intriguing but I have a glass induction cooktop and while I know it is heat resistant, I cringe at the notion of setting down a 500° skillet. Crazy?

I might be leary too MizLizzie! I have a gas range.

Mizlizzie,

You can use a silicone mat to protect the induction cooktop (I personally love the Lamson Sharp Hotspot). There is no problem with getting the pan super hot. You may melt some of the silicone pads over 650F degrees though which is not hard to do with cast iron.

Thanks, homepro01. I do always use a silicone mat under my vintage cast-iron, and usually under my Staub.

Last time I cooked steaks on the stove in a cast iron pan the smoke alarms went nuts. I realized I would never be able to use this method again, so we continue to grill outdoors. :-)

Years ago I discovered Cook's Illustrated reverse searing method for fixing steaks on the stove top. Basically, you roast the steak at a very low temperature until about 10 degrees below your target temp. Then you sear it quickly on the stove. The end result is a perfectly cooked steak.

Here's a LINK to a Serious Eats article describing that technique.

"reverse searing method "

Same concept for roasting chicken, turkey, ----any meat.

For chicken - The lowest your oven can go, check internal temperature, then go to very high, or broil, or torch, to crisp up the skin.

dcarch