The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science

have of getting into the meat during the short roasting or
pan-searing time?
To test this, I cooked four identical prime rib roasts. The
first was cooked with the bone on. For the second, I
removed the bone but then tied it back against the meat for
cooking. For the third, I removed the bone and tied it back
against the meat, but with an intervening piece of
impermeable heavy-duty aluminum foil. The fourth was
cooked without the bone.
Tasted side by side, the first three were indistinguishable
from one another. The fourth, on the other hand, was a little
tougher in the region next to where the bone used to be.
What does this indicate? Well, first off, it means the flavor
exchange theory is 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 serves at least
one important function: it insulates the meat, slowing its
cooking and providing less surface area to lose moisture.