We present a simple technique for the computation of coarse-scale steady states of dynamical systems with time scale separation in the form of a "wrapper" around a fine-scale simulator. We discuss how this approach alleviates certain problems encountered by comparable existing approaches, and illustrate its use by computing coarse-scale steady states of a lattice Boltzmann fine scale code. Interestingly, in the same context of multiple time scale problems, the approach can be slightly modified to provide initial conditions on the slow manifold with prescribed coarse-scale observables. The approach is based on appropriately designed short bursts of the fine-scale simulator whose results are used to track changes in the coarse variables of interest, a core component of the equation-free framework. (C) 2011 Published by Elsevier Ltd.