Tryin' Out Chillin' and Grillin' Tri-Tip While on Quarantine...

[thirdeye]

We don't have Stay-At-Home orders, just very strong recommendations to refrain from non-essential activities, and manage essential activities to slow the spread as fast as we can. And although many businesses have curbside delivery (even Home Depot), what this means for us is taking turns shopping every 10 or 12 days and visiting two stores only. Generally we get what we need, but can't always get what we want.... meaning, I might have ribeyes on my list for steak night, but have to settle for some other cut of beef instead. For some reason, tri-tip has been readily available almost every shopping trip.

So, I had never cooked a tri-tip in my sous vide water bath. Steaks, chicken breasts, pork chops, fish, shrimp, even eggs... but never a tri-tip. I always did them Santa Maria style, hot and fast on my Egg. This week was another first, I saw twin packs of tri-tip and these were branded Certified Herford Beef, and I cooked one last night.

These were well marbled, and a little heavier than normal (almost 3# each). With sous vide cooking, what seasoning goes in the bag stays in the bag until the end sear. I injected with Big Poppa's Cattle Prod, then seasoned heavily with Montreal Steak Seasoning, two pats of butter also went in the bag. We like medium rare so I set the water temp at 133°, and let it soak for 3 hours. Before the end sear, I shocked it in an ice bath for 20 minutes while the Egg came up to 400°. (Some cooks use nuclear charcoal temps, but I'm not in that camp.)

Steaks or chops are a pretty fast cook maybe 3 or 4 minutes, but I took a little time to built the crust, maybe 10 or 12 minutes with the dome open most of the time.

Here is the finished roast. The injection added to the natural beefy flavor of tri-tip,and the Montreal being so coarse was a good fit for the sous vide part of this cook. Because of the dramatic grain change, I always make a sketch of each tri-tip so I don't miss the first cut. The piece on the left will get sliced at a different angle than the piece I sliced on the right.

Overall I'm pleased with this new adventure, and at the rate I'm buying them that's a good thing. :thumb: Thanks for looking.

 

[KClandcruiser]

Looks fantastic! About the perfect sear too.

I probably should dust off the ole SV and put it back into the cooking rotation

 

[Big George's BBQ]

YUM That looks perfect I Sous Vide a pork chop Sat Did it for 1.5 hrs at 145 and panned seared in a cast iron skillet My wife's reply "this is really good"

 

[thirdeye]

YUM That looks perfect I Sous Vide a pork chop Sat Did it for 1.5 hrs at 145 and panned seared in a cast iron skillet My wife's reply "this is really good"

140° is my chop temp, and 147° on chicken breasts (I think my favorite way to cook them). It's amazing what 1° will make.

 

[Smokinmoose]

Wow! That looks fantastic. Nice job!

 

[Stingerhook]

Perfection on a cutting board!

 

[Smoking Piney]

Perfection! :-D

 

[LordRiffenstein]

That makes me drool!

 

[Titch]

That looks very good,very very good
If I may, when using souse vide does the meat need the ice bath?
We souse vide often and never thought to ice shock.

 

[thirdeye]

That looks very good,very very good
If I may, when using souse vide does the meat need the ice bath?
We souse vide often and never thought to ice shock.

I don't ice shock the usual things like a steak or chops, just pat them dry, rest a few minutes and end sear UNLESS.... I'm planning on holding them until later in the day or not serving until the next day. I think this is the drill for restaurants that use sous vide.

Since I'm new with sous vide on tri-tip, and because of it's thickness I didn't want to let the internal fall on its own, so the ice bath brought the internal down enough that even my longer sear time did not overshoot my target internal of 133°. After the sear, the internal was 126°.

 

[Al Czervik]

Perfectly done, thirdeye... :clap: