Went to the grocery story prior to embarking on a semi remote logging job.
Bought a tri tip on sale ($20) due to it aging out.
I am going to put a black garlic infused honey marinad on it a double wrap in foil.
Since the only and simplest way to cook is to put in a bit of a pit and cover with coals from a slash burn pile.
How long would you guess it would take to cook.i am thinking 5-6 hours. Thoughts?
Thanks guys.

I think a tri-tip will be way over done at 5-6 hours unless you want it well done. I aim for med rare and they're usually done in 2-3 hours and that's on the smoker at 250. I did one at 185 once and it only took 4.5 hours IIRC.

Bring an instant read thermometer with to keep an eye on the temps.

Here is a recipe for a tri-tip in the oven. Do you have a cast iron dutch oven? If so, could place it in the DO and put coals on the bottom and half again the coals on top and use it like an oven.

Recipe says 30-40 minutes for a 2 pound roast.

Tri Tip recipe - Oven

You don't want to cook tri-tip for 6 hours

It needs a hot and fast grilling/roasting to be best

Grill to medium and slice thin and make sure you watch how the grain changes direction so you are always cutting across the grain.

Can you rig something so it's roasting over coals?

quote:

Originally posted by PASig:
It needs a hot and fast grilling/roasting to be best

Not in my experience. Quite the opposite. I prefer my tri-tip smoked low and slow.

But as noted above, even smoking at 225-250, it only takes about 1.5-2 hours to do a typical tri-tip.

So at the hotter temps of a campfire/coals, it'd be even less. Likely well under an hour. Way less than 5-6 hours.

Yea, blew it by not bring the Dutch oven.
Was thinking double wrapping and set on some coals and then bury it I could keep Temps under 250, maybe closer to 200

Dug a pit about the size of a 5 gal. Bucket laid on its side. Filled 1/3 with coals. Put roast on top. Added soil on top. An hour later exposed the top of the roast. Barely felt warm. So added a layer of coals on top then added a thin layer of soil. Then added another layer of coals then another thin la of layer of soil which brought up to grade. Left for another 1-1/2. At that point I thought I should check it as I did not want to over cook it.
It was perfect, juicy, tender and great flavor. About as good as it gets. It was delicious.

Perfect!

The moral of the story: "Just cook and eat it outside. Everything tastes better."

quote:

Originally posted by Loswsmith:
Perfect!

The moral of the story: "Just cook and eat it outside. Everything tastes better."

Even when you shove a stick through it and hold it over the fire.

I've cooked tritip both fast like a steak and slow like a brisket.
It's a toss up on which I like the best.
Steak-like is beefier but a bit more chewy.
Brisket-like is more tender but not as beefy.

Tri-tip cooked like steak over medium direct heat is best. Way too lean to benefit from low and slow.

If you aren’t very familiar with how to cut this, take a moment to Google that too. There are two very distinct directional grains on that piece of meat and you’re gonna want to cut across both of them or you’re going to have the chewiest piece of crap you’ve ever imagined.