T-bone and Porterhouse

[UTH]

Do you consider these different things, or exactly the same?

My understanding is that they are similar, but a Porterhouse means the fillet is much bigger.
I called my local butcher just now to reserve a Porterhouse to collect late, and he said "a T-bone?"
Obviously I said yes please, but in my mind they're not quite the same thing.

[Leon R]

Porterhouse is bigger so if you are paying for one I would expect that.

[48k]

UTH said:

My understanding is that they are similar, but a Porterhouse means the fillet is much bigger.

Agreed - Porterhouse has a much bigger fillet section than a T-bone because it is cut from further back.

[UTH]

Ok spot on, exactly as I thought then.
Surprised the butcher clearly thinks they're the same thing, otherwise surely he would have said yes to a porterhouse instead of mentioning a T-bone.
Oh well, I'll see what they have when I go and get it.

[48k]

UTH said:

Ok spot on, exactly as I thought then.
Surprised the butcher clearly thinks they're the same thing, otherwise surely he would have said yes to a porterhouse instead of mentioning a T-bone.
Oh well, I'll see what they have when I go and get it.

What did you receive in the end?

[UTH]

48k said:

UTH said:

Ok spot on, exactly as I thought then.
Surprised the butcher clearly thinks they're the same thing, otherwise surely he would have said yes to a porterhouse instead of mentioning a T-bone.
Oh well, I'll see what they have when I go and get it.

What did you receive in the end?

I asked for him to cut me a bit with bigger fillet from the huge piece labeled T-bone in their fridge.
I’d say I got a porterhouse, but I think they’d say it was all T-bone.

[21TonyK]

To me, as long as thats thick enough is looks like a porterhouse but there used to be/are a couple of butchers on here. Maybe get their comment but my experience is that quite a lot of butchers "know what they know" and once you get into less common cuts they either look at you blankly or need a bit of guidance and that goes for commercial master butchers as well.

In the end you could always get what you wanted but part of the difficulty is names for different cuts and who they are cut can vary across the country. I did post up a few links to the stuff I used to use when speccing stuff, might be worth a search, but also Nottingham Uni's Muscle Cuts book is a bit of a bible for international butchery.

[UTH]

I guess T-bone/Porterhouse is a bit of a grey area as a t-bone only becomes a porterhouse when the fillet is “bigger” so what’s the actual cutoff point.

This image does agree they are two different things though.

[UTH]

Actually this one shows the difference a bit better

[Googie]

Mentioned this to a local butcher out of curiosity- he says that he doesn’t do a Porterhouse cut as it leaves him with poor fillets which I didn’t fully understand. He was also of the view that Porterhouse originated in US-had always thought it was a UK term so everyday a school day…

[UTH]

I guess if a butcher doesn’t go with the Porterhouse idea you just need to request a T-bone with more fillet on it

The opposite end of what I bought yesterday had the tiniest piece of fillet I’d ever seen so you’d be annoyed if that’s what you got !

[JuanCarlosFandango]

I thought porterhouse was a US term too, but the Internet seems to agree. A filet of 1.25" or greater makes it a porterhouse.

[UTH]

Which confirms in my mind you’re gonna be bloody annoyed if you order a T-bone online for delivery and you end up with the one of the left hoping for the one on the right. If they don’t separate t-bone from porterhouse you could end up with either one?

[48k]

JuanCarlosFandango said:

I thought porterhouse was a US term too, but the Internet seems to agree.

The internet is very Americanised TBF so you have to bear that in mind with your search terms.

[sean ie3]

I always thought a porterhouse was 2 fingers, agreed some fingers are thicker than others.

[21TonyK]

correct, its cut thicker than a t-bone. a lot of the "info on the internet" is reproduced incorrectly and/or incomplete

[UTH]

21TonyK said:

correct, its cut thicker than a t-bone. a lot of the "info on the internet" is reproduced incorrectly and/or incomplete

So it’s not the size of the fillet section it’s just the overall thickness of the whole thing?

[21TonyK]

UTH said:

21TonyK said:

correct, its cut thicker than a t-bone. a lot of the "info on the internet" is reproduced incorrectly and/or incomplete

So it’s not the size of the fillet section it’s just the overall thickness of the whole thing?

Both, the fillet should be larger but just as importantly a porterhouse is at least 1.5" thick. All these diagrams with measurements can be misleading.

[UTH]

21TonyK said:

UTH said:

21TonyK said:

correct, its cut thicker than a t-bone. a lot of the "info on the internet" is reproduced incorrectly and/or incomplete

So it’s not the size of the fillet section it’s just the overall thickness of the whole thing?

Both, the fillet should be larger but just as importantly a porterhouse is at least 1.5" thick. All these diagrams with measurements can be misleading.

Ok I get what you mean
Although I’d be disappointed if any T-bone I was sold was less than 1.5 anyway.