A Note on Steak by Paul Goldner:
Cooking a steak in a skillet, and on the grill, are two very different things. A grill compares exactly to your broiler. A skillet, on the other hand, is a ULTRA fast cooker. The heat conductivity of the surfaces is very different, due mostly to the distribution of your surfaces.

Cooking a steak on the grill is good. Cooking a high quality steak in the skillet is actually a very effective way of cooking for tenderness AND flavor, if the meat is already tender. When you cook something at high heat, it obviously takes less time to cook. However, if you have a thick cut of steak, the center won't be cooked when you have seared the outside.

So, basically, steaks such as strip steak, or tenderloin, can be cut thin, and cooked quickly in a skillet, similar to making veal cutlets. You'll sear the meat, giving it a flavor that the grill won't do, but you won't overcook the meat, so it will still be very tender.

on the OTHER hand, if you have a thick, or tough cut of meat, cooking it in the skillet makes the peice of meat far too tough to eat. It has to cook too long, destroying any tenderness it may have. For these cuts of meat, the grill works best. Thus, you have the london broil method of cooking. Cooking on the grill, or under the broiler, will cook the CENTER of a peice of meat faster then a skillet does, and so you can perserve the tenderness of a thicker steak.

Both methods work great for steak. Simply match the method to the steak.
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