Kerry - tenderizing steaks truly depends

on the cut of meat you use. Check in your cookbooks, they will
tell you the cuts of meat that are most tender for steaks. Also,
as the prior posts have suggested, marinating, using an acid
based marinade, helps, as does breaking down the fiber in a
tougher cut of steak by just plain old pounding with a meat
tenderizing mallet. And, of course, most supermarkets sell
powdered meat tenderizer to put on the meat. You will find
it in the spices section.

Cuts of meat are often named for the bones they contain (ie: rib
roast, t-bone steak etc.) Bone shape often is an indication of
the tenderness of a specific cut of meat. Tender cuts generally,
lie in those sections of the the animal where least movement &
stress occur. Your butcher at the supermarket (even very large
ones, markets, not butchers) will take a few minutes to answer
meat questions. A good basic cookbook, Betty Crocker, Better
Homes, Good Housekeeping and the old standby, Joy of Cooking
will all have that info in them too.

So part of the answer to your questions is not only how to
tenderize meat, but also, which cuts of meat to purchase if
tenderness is one of the things you are primarily looking for
in the meat. This is probably more info than you wanted, but
I hope it helps.