First time doing low slow beef and it turned out a bit dry. Flavor is beyond my expectation though.
My guess is the temp is a bit high when smoking. Ambient thermometer read 270 but dome read 330. It took 1h45m to reach 160 before wrapping in foil, felt a bit too fast. And another 1h to reach 205 after wrapping. Then let it rest 45 min.
Any suggestions to improve?
by littne
2 Comments
Is this sarcasm? Why are you cooking to 200 degree internal?
I haven’t tried this, but my understanding is that the tri tip cut of meat doesn’t lend itself well to this cooking method. Smoking low and slow works best with cuts of meat that have fat in them and/or significant amounts of connective tissue/collagen/etc. The low/slow method breaks down those components in ways that hot/fast cooking does not.
The tri tip is very very lean and doesn’t have other connective “gunk” in it. So, I don’t think your meat was dry because the temp was too high. I think it was dry because you cooked it so long that what moisture was there evaporated out of it, and there wasn’t a bunch of fat/collagen to replace that moisture.
To each his own, of course. My personal opinion informed by amateur cooking knowledge at best is: tri tip is best as steak, not as low/slow meat. I think the other commenter is a little incredulous because you essentially made this to be very well done steak.