Easy Smoked Tri Tip Recipe The Poor Man’s Steak

This Smoked Tri Tip recipe is a good start to any meal. Tri-Tip steaks (roast) are a tender, Juicy, and favorable steak when cooked right. It has been an underrated cut of beef for a long time, that has grown in popularity over the years.

Some Info About Tri-Tip Before We Start

Smoked Tri-Tip

This smoked tri-tip recipe is an easy recipe to do and will produce a juicy and tender piece of meat, that will make the whole family happy. It’s a basic recipe that you can follow or make adjustments to easily. I am posting this recipe because it’s great for the first time smoking tri-tip. Plus a very nice recipe for those who have done it before, to follow and make adjustments too.

Trimming The Tri-Tip

Depending on where you got your tri-tip from, the fat cap might already be trimmed off. If it still has it, I trim sparingly. Tri-tip like most steaks is a lean cut of meat. I like to leave the fat cap around 1/8-1/4 inch thick so the juices from it soak into the tri-tip while cooking. During the slow cook process, I leave the fat cap up for this reason. You just don’t want to leave it too thick.

Trim based of your preference.

Seasoning The Tri-Tip

We are going to grab a bottle of yellow mustard or olive oil and apply a light coat all around the tri-tip. I used olive oil this time. Normally I prefer yellow mustard though. We are using this as our binder.

What is a binder?

(This step is optional some people always use a binder others don’t)

Basically, a binder is used to help hold the spices to the food, to give them more time to soak in, and keep the spices from falling off as easily.

Then we are going to take some Kosher salt and sprinkle a nice coating of it on the tri-tip.

Next, we are going to repeat this process and apply a layer of Ground pepper. Once You have applied the salt and pepper to one side flip the tri-tip over and do the same to the other side

Apply to your preference once again. The amount of spice will take a few cooks to get dialed in. Using a good dry rub or even a store-bought one is another good option. I would just use a basic salt and pepper rub if it’s your first time smoking tri-tip to get a good basic feel of it.

After applying the dry rub(spices) I will normally place it back in the fridge for about an hour to give the spices time to soak in some. After 45 mins to an hour, I will pull the tri-tip out of the fridge and go start up the smoker.

Letting the tri-tip set out for 15 mins or so before placing on the smoker will help it cook more evenly.

Smoking The Tri-Tip

What we need is to go get our smoker to a temp of 225° F and keep it as stable as possible throughout the cook. That is one of the advantages of a pellet smoker.

Smoking can be done with other methods as well. The use of an electric smoker or an offset smoker works very well too. A Grill set up to cook with indirect heat and a smoke box or smoke tube work as well with some practice.

For this smoke we are using a pellet grill. The temp is set at 225° F and is ready to smoke.

We are going to smoke the tri-tip for around 1/2 an hour per pound. Judging by temp is a better way to go though.

This is a great time to use a temp sensor if you have one.

If your Smoker/Grill does not have a Temp probe built in. There are some cheap alternatives that work nicely. I have one listed on my accessories review page

Roughly 2 hours later the tri-tip has reached my desired temp of 125­° F. We are going to pull it off when the tri-tip gets to within 5-10° of the desired temp for a sec. The reason is we are going to sear it. I will double-check with my instant-read thermometer to make sure it’s at my desired temp.

I want to pull the tri-tip off around 125° F for this step( I am shooting for a final temp of 130°-135° F for this step)( I cook my tri-tip Med-rare)

Time to pull it off.

Here is a chart giving you some basic guidelines of the temps you want. I cook my trip tip to a medium-rare. I do not recommend cooking them past medium. Tri-tip gets tough and chewy past medium and the taste changes. But we all have our preferences. But after medium tri-tip is not that good in my opinion

STEAK TEMPERATURE CHART

Steak Doneness	Temperature (°F)	Temperature (°C)
Bleu Steak	110°F	43°C
Rare Steak	120–130°F	49–54°C
Medium Rare Steak	130–135°F	54–57°C
Medium Steak	135–145°F	57–63°C
Medium Well Steak	145–155°F	63–68°C
Well Done Steak	155°F and up	68°C and up

Searing Our Tri Tip

For this step I am going to pull off the tri tip and cover it in tin foil.

The reason for this is I want to raise the temp of my pellet smoker to 400°-450° f and open my sear plate. Once the smoker gets up to around 400° I will put the tri-tip back on the smoker.

At this point I like to flip it every 3-4 mins. Be careful and pay attention when the flames reach the fat cap they will flare

After each side has been cooked for 3-4 mins I will use my instant-read thermometer to check the temps. If not the right temp. I will keep flipping every couple mins until I get the desired temp (130-135) in my case

If your smoker does not have the option of a sear plate there are a few other options.

Cast Iron Skillet

One of the options is to grab a cast-iron skillet and just use your stove to sear it. Just throw 2-3 tablespoons of butter in a pan, once it has melted and starts sizzling. Throw in the tri-tip and cook for 2-3 mins per side.

On The Grill

Another option is to use your grill if you have one and have been using a smoker. Heat the grill up to a med-high heat (I normally shoot for 450°f or so) and grill it on each side for 3-4 mins

Let The Tri Tip Rest

Once you have the tri tip seared. It’s time to let it rest. Cover it with tin Foil and let it sit for 15 mins. It does not have to be tight wrap. Just need to tent the foil over the tri tip to hold the heat in.

Time To See How We Did

Looks yummy. I guess its time to eat.

If you have any questions or comments would love to hear them.

would love to know how your Tri Tip turned out

Thanks