Smoke & Spice, by Cheryl and Bill Jamison, has a nice looking recipe for beef tenderloin I thought I'd try.
Not knowing anything about beef tenderloin, I went to the local grocery store and asked at the meat counter. The butcher pointed to the display of filet mignon in the meat case and said, "Right there." I was speechless for a few seconds, but finally said, "Wow, that's expensive."
I had to pass on the $18.99 / lb. filet mignon, but the butcher suggested that I try rib eye steak as a substitute for $5.99 / lb. I specifically asked for two pounds, but before I could stop him he sliced off two 1 lb. slabs. I'm going to try them anyway.
The Drunk and Dirty Tenderloin is on page 115 of the Smoke & Spice book and calls for a marinade of soy sauce, worchestershire, sour mash whiskey, brown sugar, ginger, and garlic cloves. The rub is a very basic mixture of black pepper and white pepper applied just prior to putting on the smoker.
I'll let you know how the Drunk and Dirty Rib Eye turns out and post some pictures later today.
2 comments:
After getting so much benefit from your blog for the past year, I finally get to return a tiny bit of the favor.
Forget paying $19 a lb for filet mignon (local price here). You can buy the whole tenderloin at $9 a lb (cyropak) and hand trim it yourself. It's not any harder than trimming a spare St Louis style. Trim off the "chain of bull" from the side and then remove the silver skin membrane.
Cut 2/3 of it into filets (vacuum seal and freeze them if you like) and save the last third (the thicker end) for a tenderloin roast (search Southern Living's site for their portobello-marsala sauce for the roast...incredibly good).
Take the "chain of bull" trimming and use it to grind an 80/20 burger mix or make Alton Brown's cheese steak recipe. That way you have very little waste.
Thanks for the tips Chris. I remember seeing whole tenderloins at Sam's Club.
This was a spur of the moment thing and the nearest Sam's is about 20 miles away. I had to settle for the "retail prices" this time.
My 1 lb. rib eyes turned out great using the same recipe.
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