Smoking Tri Tip Like a Brisket - Low and Slow

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tri tip can bring classic brisket flavor in a smaller cut

Think of tri tip the next time you're cooking a family meal or prepping for a hot date, if you love tasty beef. Sure, brisket is delicious, but it is large. Chuck roast is pretty big too, and maybe more than you may want to wrestle with for a meal. Tri tip may be the meat for you! It can be seasoned and smoked in a way to have all of the goodness of brisket, but in less time.

Tri tip has less external fat than a brisket, and often has less marbling. The muscle is two different masses bound together with just a bit of fat and collagen. A lot of cooks treat it like a steak, and that is fine. But to enjoy the smoke ring and tender meat associated with brisket is fabulous.

Don't just throw your tri tip into the smoker and hope for the best, though. Without thoughtfulness and care, you could end up with a dry and tough piece of meat which will be a chore to eat. Condider some important factors in smoking tri tip:

Tri tip is a smaller cut of meat, so its temperature will rise more quickly.
Tri tip is more lean than brisket, so focus on ways to keep the meat moist and tender.
Allow the tri tip to cook at a stable post-stall temperature for more time than a brisket. Use a lower smoker temperature and monitor the rise within the meat.

Prep the night before

As with smoking a brisket or chuck, the best results for tri tip come from starting on it the day before. For serving it at lunch time, definitely do prep work the evening before. For a smoked tri tip dinner, you'll have enough time if starting at the crack of dawn. I am not a morning person, so I still prep the night before.

Trimming the fat and Seasoning the Meat

Refrigerate the tri tip for an hour or two at a temperature just above freezing to make the meat and fat firm for trimming. Use a sharp knife to trim off the large areas of fat and any loose dangly bits of meat hanging on to the tri tip.

Season the tri tip with whatever like: a salt / pepper / garlic dry rub, a mustard or oil binder topped by a zesty commercial spice mix - anything which suits your tastes. A very nice and simple dry rub is Rub Wise Texas Brisket BBQ Rub. After seasoning, let the tri tip sit overnight in the refrigerator to absorb the spices. Keep the meat refrigerated until it is almost time to start smoking it.

Starting the Smoker

As cooking time approaches, think a bit about the heat and time. Set up a stable, but hotter temperature than you would use for a brisket. For tri tip, make the air temperature about 250 °F (120 °C). Some people will use even higher temperatures, but I suggest to stay with the modest bump in heat and not hurry. Expect about three hours to reach the temperature for wrapping, thence another two hours in the smoker to reach the final internal temperature.

Use a meat thermometer probe to keep track of the internal temperature during the smoking process. Wireless units are convenient; use whatever is on hand.

The Tri Tip Stall

Smoking is a matter of the meat absorbing heat until the temperature deep inside gets to the proper finishing value. Tri tip is not as heavy a cut of meat as brisket; the temperature will rise somewhat faster. Also, the stall is less flat. The meat's nternal temperature will gradually rise, but at a notably more shallow rate during the stall. A typical tri tip needs about three hours to go from room temperature, through the stall, to reach the temperature at which it should be wrapped.

As the tri tip heats up, water will will evaporate off of the surface, and more water deep in the meat will move out toward the surface - also to evaporate. Water takes heat to evaporate, drawing away energy which would otherwise heat the chuck roast meat. Somewhere around 155 °F to 160 °F (68° C to 71° C) is where a great deal of the water evaporation happens, causing the temperature rise to become slow. When most of the water has evaporated, the stall ends and the meat temperature goes up more sharply.

Track the stall by checking the internal temperature every half hour. More frequently is probably just extra work; less often may cause you to miss the end of the stall.

The stall is a natural aspect of cooking a large piece of meat; do not ruin the tri tip by fighting the stall with a higher smoking temperature. Give it time and be patient. There are incredibly tasty tri tips smoked at lower temperatures, near 220 °F (105 °C), which take even more time. As you wait, remind yourself how delicious the finished meat will be!

Watch for the internal meat to warm above 160 °F (71° C). When that happens, the stall is over and it it time to wrap the meat. Do this, as it is the key to keeping the tri tip moist and tender.

Pro tip: If your tri tip gets out of the stall too fast (two and a half hours or less), lower your smoker temperature to slow down the process. You don't want to dry out or overcook the tri tip. Reduce the smoker temperature to 220 °F (105 °C) for the "wrapped" phase of the cooking and let it take more time to finish.

Wraping the Tri Tip

When the temperature stall has ended, remove the tri tip from the smoker. Wrap it in two layers of butcher paper or a layer of heavy aluminum foil. If desired, for yet more protection against dryness, about three tablespoons of one of the following can be drizzled onto the meat:

A 50/50 mix of apple juice and water.
Melted butter.
Beef taloe.
Cider vinegar
An even mix of soy sauce, water, and lime or lemon juice.

When the tri tip is wrapped, put it back into the smoker to continue cooking. The next milestone is the final temperature of 205° F (96° C). Do not let the meat continue to any hotter temperatures. It will take at least two but probably not as long as three hours to reach the temperature at which the tri tip should be removed from the smoker.

Resting the Tri Tip Before Serving

When the tri tip's internal temperature hits the target, and it is removed from the smoker, let it rest and cool down. Now is when the awesome silky and tender texture of a well smoked meat is set up. Let the tri tip rest, wrapped, for at least thirty minutes, up to as long as an hour before serving.

When the resting interval is finished, unwrap the tri tip. Place it on a cutting board, and slice it into quarter inch or 1/2 centimeter thick sements, cutting across the grain of the meat. Tri tip can be tricky to cut, as the grain changes as you move from one set of muscle fibers to the other. When you see the grain change, just rotate the meat and cut across the new grain.

Eat and enjoy with a tossed salad, baked potato, steamed broccoli, or other vegetables. Nicely smoked tri tip is a delicious meat you and your guests or family will greatly enjoy.