Smoked Tri-Tip Steak with Cilantro Chimichurri Sauce

Begin by rubbing your tri-tip with the olive oil. This will help the salt, pepper, garlic, and rosemary stick to the meat. Let this marinate for at least four hours.

While the meat marinates, make the chimichurri sauce. Let me stop right here and say if you have never had chimichurri sauce, it is simply a must make. Chimichurri is typically made with parsley and similar ingredients listed above, however I thought I would mix it up a bit and replace parsley with cilantro, and I am glad that I did.

So to make the chimichurri, add all of the sauce ingredients except the olive oil to a food processor, and pulse it down on the chop dial. You do not want a puree here, but you want it somewhat coarse. When everything is broken down, remove the blade and whisk in your olive oil. Take a taste, and adjust any salt or pepper as needed. Right off the bat you get a great punch of garlic and cilantro, and some of the sweet and spice of the peppadews. Pour into a bowl and place in the refrigerator until you are ready to serve.

Take your meat out, and let it come to room temperature as you fire up your grill, or in my case my grill and smoker combination. Get your coals nice and hot. I believe in using charcoal with this type of meat as it gives it that smokey flavor you should be seeking. Your grill should register around 400 degrees F before placing your tri-tip on the grill.

Once your grill is ready, add the tri-tip, and cover the grill. Cook for about 40-50 minutes, or until the meat registers around 130 to 135 degrees F. During the last 5 minutes of cooking, add the handful of soaked cherry wood chips to the coals, covering the grill again, and let the tri-tip get a nice hit of the cherry smoke. Just this little bit of smoke adds some really great flavor to the meat.

Remove the meat, and place in a pan to let rest, tenting it with foil. This rest time will allow all of the juices to remain in the steak, while bringing the temperature of the steak up to a medium heat, which I think is the best temperature to eat good meat. So after letting the tri-tip rest for about 20 minutes, begin to slice the meat, against the grain, into about one inch slices.

Place a few strips of the tri-tip onto a plate and generously drizzle with the cilantro chimichurri sauce. I am not kidding when I say every bite is packed full of phenomenal flavor. You get a bit of the smoked cherry in the tri-tip with the awesome flavors of garlic, rosemary, and cilantro. As my wife and I sat there and ate the slices of meat, we were just blown away by the complexity of the really simple ingredients. Not only that but the steak itself was just so tender and delicious.