Barbecued Tri Tip With Caramelized Red Onions

Barbecued Tri Tip

Caramelized Red Onions

Backstory

I fell in love with tri tip roasts after my wife and I moved into our first apartment years ago. One of the local supermarkets would grill them in the parking lot on summer weekends. Customers would come by and purchase them to serve at their backyard barbecues or slice, refrigerate and use it for sandwiches during the work week. My wife and I purchased one and served it to some friends and family on one particular Sunday night. It began a weekly tradition where a few of us would gather on Sunday nights for dinner and good company.

That tradition ended when we moved, but we re-kindled it this past Memorial Day. Not all the original participants were present but the same spirit prevailed. Also, there were a few new additions that weren’t around years ago (marriages occurred, kids were born, and new friends were gained etc.)

When we purchased a gas grill last year, one of the first things I bought was a tri tip roast, but lately I haven’t purchased it as often because I have generally found that London Broil is cheaper. I’ve also gotten a little bored with it, so I went online to look for a way to breathe new life into my favorite cut of beef.

Recipe

My source for the majority of my recipes is foodbuzz because I enjoy the narrative my fellow bloggers bring with their respective recipes and also because the authors of each post really convey their passion for the food they’ve prepared.

I discovered the website for my source of this recipe through a segment on Malou Review, a weekly lifestyle and entertainment program hosted by Malou Nubla and broadcast on KTVU-TV. In this particular episode, she reviews foodbuzz in addition to my source for this recipe, epicurious.com. Epicurious is much more of a corporate entity (it lacks the foodbuzz passion), because it draws many of its recipes from bon appetit and Gourmet magazines, but this recipe looked too good not to try it.

This recipe uses the Red Wine Barbecue Sauce that I profiled in my last post.

Notes

1. Tri Tip Roasts. This recipe calls for garlic powder to be used in the dry rub however I couldn’t justify using it, as I had fresh garlic cloves available. I minced two or three cloves as a substitute. Grilling the roasts were uneventful until I started basting them with the barbecue sauce. After twenty minutes on medium-low heat, my grill flared up and charred one side of a roast, probably due to repeated application of the sauce. Normally I would keep a closer eye on the grill, but I had guests to entertain in addition to trying to monitor the onions.

Tri Tips After Initial Application of the Red Wine Barbecue Sauce

Charred After Flare-Up

2. Caramelized Onions. I’ve had some experience with caramelizing onions with Barbecue Chicken, Caramelized Onions and Gouda Quesadilla recipe. There were some similarities in the cooking method but I also noted differences. I found a great article that explains the concept at ehow.com. I thought about adding some sugar into it but I didn’t think it would blend well with the balsamic vinegar.

The concerns I had with Grilled Peppered Steak With Cabernet Balsamic Sauce were realized here. I couldn’t monitor the tri tip roasts on the grill and my onions on the stove top simultaneously, so I had to enlist the assistance of one of my guests and my wife to help with the onions. The recipe notes that the onions can be prepared one day ahead of the tri tip but I wanted everything fresh for my guests. As I was reading the reviews, one noted that he cooked the onions on the side burner of his grill but my barbecue doesn’t have a side burner. (I opted for one with two side tables instead.)

Epicurious notes in its cooking method to stir the onions frequently. The instructions I gave to my friend and wife were continual. What we found that after twenty minutes was softened onions, but now browned. This was easily solved by letting them sit for one minute intervals before stirring again.

Onions Just Starting to Caramelize

Final Thoughts

This meal is definitely worth repeating and my guests were very happy with this tasty dish. The caramelized onions were the star of the dish. The flavor of the red wine barbecue sauce wasn’t as strong as I anticipated probably because it was mostly charred off as I explained above. You might notice that the quality of pictures in this blog post have greatly increased, primarily because I didn’t take the pictures. I wanted to feature them because two of my dinner guests on this particular evening were Franz and Bert Dimson of Dimson Photographers who were kind enough to take pictures while I prepared the food.

Enjoy!