Carne Asada Tri Tip
Carne asada tri tip marinated in orange, lime, garlic, and chiles, grilled hot and sliced thin for tacos. Big citrus-chile flavor on a bigger cut.
Cooking for a bigger table? The tri tip serving calculator sizes the roast for any head count.
Carne asada is usually skirt or flank steak, but tri tip takes the same citrus-and-chile marinade beautifully and feeds more people from one cut. Orange and lime brighten it, garlic and cumin ground it, and a little soy sauce adds the savory backbone.
Keep the marinade time in check. Citrus is aggressive: three to six hours flavors the meat without turning the surface to mush, which is what happens if you leave acid on beef overnight.
The one adjustment from classic carne asada is the fire. Skirt and flank are thin and cook through in a flash, but a whole tri tip is thick, so straight direct heat chars the outside before the middle catches up. Sear it hot to build the crust, then move it to the indirect side and finish gently to a medium-rare 130 degrees. It is the same bright, citrusy carne asada, cooked like the bigger cut it is.
Cook it hot and fast, slice thin against the grain, and pile it into warm tortillas with onion, cilantro, and a squeeze of lime. Leftovers go straight into burritos or quesadillas. It goes great with salsa roja on the side.
Carne asada is a build-your-own plate, so put the bowls out with the tortillas. Pico de gallo and guacamole mean the citrus in the marinade, the lime in the salsa, and the fat in the avocado all land in the same bite instead of taking turns.
Which cooker to use
Santa Maria grill This is the recipe as written, and red oak against citrus and chile is worth the trouble. The marinade comes off wet, so pat it as dry as step 3 says or the surface steams over direct heat instead of charring.
Charcoal grill Also the recipe as written, and the easier version of it. Drop a chunk or two of oak on the coals if you have it, since that smoke is most of what a Santa Maria fire gives you that a kettle doesn’t.
Gas grill The grill most people actually own, and it does fine here because the marinade is carrying the flavor, not the fire. You lose the oak, so set a foil packet of soaked oak or cherry chips over the lit burner and keep the roast on the unlit side once the direct-heat sear is done. Go the full six hours in the marinade rather than three.
Smoker Smoke sits on top of a citrus marinade instead of blending into it, and on a cut this lean it takes very little to go too far. If you want smoke on tri tip, the smoked tri tip recipe is built around it.
Sous vide Char is the point of carne asada and a bath gives you none of it. If you want the water doing the temperature work, the sous vide tri tip recipe is written for it.
Ingredients
- 1 whole tri tip roast (2-3 lbs), trimmed
- 1/2 cup orange juice
- 1/4 cup lime juice (about 3 limes)
- 1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
- 4 cloves garlic, minced
- 1 jalapeno, seeded and minced
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 teaspoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
Instructions
- 1
Whisk orange juice, lime juice, cilantro, garlic, jalapeno, soy sauce, olive oil, cumin, chili powder, and salt.
Orange balances the lime so the marinade is bright but not harsh. Soy adds the savory depth that pure citrus misses.
- 2
Marinate the tri tip in the mixture, refrigerated, for 3 to 6 hours.
Citrus is acidic. Past about 8 hours it starts to break the surface down and turn it mushy, so stay under it.
- 3
Remove from the marinade, pat dry, and rest at room temperature 30 minutes. Build a hot fire.
Carne asada is cooked hot and fast over high heat, so get the grill as hot as it goes.
- 4
Sear over direct high heat 4 to 5 minutes per side, then move to the indirect side and cook to a medium-rare 130 degrees F, pulling at 125 degrees F.
A whole tri tip is far thicker than skirt or flank, so direct heat the whole way chars the outside before the center is done. The two-zone finish brings the center up to temp while the crust holds. Go by the thermometer, not the clock.
- 5
Rest 10 minutes, then slice thin against the grain and chop for tacos.
Split the roast where the grain switches direction, slice each half thin, then cross-cut into bite-size pieces for the tortillas.
Nutrition Facts
Per serving
- Calories
- 350
- Protein
- 42 g
- Fat
- 18 g
- Sat. Fat
- 7 g
- Carbs
- 3 g
- Fiber
- 0 g
- Sodium
- 620 mg
- Cholesterol
- 105 mg
Values are estimates based on standard ingredients and serving sizes.
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