Meat Cuts

• Rib-eye steaks are cut from the rib primal of a cow, an expensive cut of meat prized for its deep marbling of fat among tender meat fibers. The muscles in this portion of the cow are not exercised as much as the legs, so the meat is rarely tough. Chicken fried steak is traditionally prepared from a beef cutlet of a less expensive cut of meat, such as skirt steak and flank steak. These cuts are leaner and more likely to become tough if overcooked.

Traditional Preparation

• The toughness of flank steak and other less expensive cuts of meat means extra care when preparing the meat to tenderize it so the finished dish isn't tough and chewy. The raw steak is pounded flat with a meat mallet to tenderize the tough meat fibers so each bite melts in your mouth. The meat is dredged in an egg or milk mixture and flour, then fried in hot oil until the batter is crispy. Rib-eye steak already melts in your mouth without being tenderized, so you can skip this entirely, even if the meat is already cooked.

Changes to Make

• Because the leftover rib-eye steak is already cooked , it only needs to be in the oil long enough to heat up the center and make the breading crispy. Dip the meat in a dredging liquid containing only buttermilk -- skip the beaten egg. If you prefer heavy breading with an extra crispy coating, dip the meat in the milk and cover it in flour twice. This adaptation works especially well for rare to medium steak rather than well-done rib-eyes so you don't overcook the steak.

Finished Dish

• The resulting dish after frying the breading to a golden brown color is almost the same as a traditional chicken fried steak, but with a few distinctions. While the steak is breaded and fried in the same style as fried chicken, the steak inside traditional chicken fried steak is almost mushy as a result of being pounded to a thin, tender cutlet. The rib-eye's thickness doesn't change, and will only be thin if you started with a thin-cut rib-eye steak, but most rib-eye steaks are cut between the rib bones, resulting in a thick steak about 1 inch thick. A pounded steak cutlet also sort of melds together with the breading, while the rib-eye steak and breading remain more or less distinct.