My favorite thing about the Central Coast or Tri-tip: Why it's so fanatastically delicious

From Wikipedia: "The tri-tip is a cut of beef from the bottom sirloin primal cut".

Before I arrived on the Central Coast, I had never heard of "tri-tip".  To be honest though, before I moved out of my mom's house, I wasn't all that familiar with cuts of meat besides what they served at Longhorn's.  And even then I rarely got past the Prime Rib.

But all that's behind me.  I have finally become a real Central Coaster (at least by my standards) because I can cook a tri-tip.

Our friend Michael was the one that cooked the first tri-tip for me besides what I've had at a restaurant. I remember thinking that if I could make one as good as he did, I would really feel like I belong.  Tri-tip, when done right, is tender, flavorful and just downright delicious.  It is the key ingredient to Santa Maria Style Barbecue, where they slow cook it just like in the south.  If you're from the south, have been to the south, or have heard of barbecue, you know that it's not the same as grilling.  Grilling is throwing some stuff on a grill to get those nice char marks.  Grilling can be anything from chicken to steak, vegetables, sweet potato, or even corn  (leave it in the husk and grill it, it is fantastic!).

Barbecue on the other hand is a learned skill.  It involves just the right cut of meat, rubs, sauces, mop sauces and sloooooow cooking.  I personally have never barbecued, but I'll get around to it eventually.

Trimmed Tri-tip

So back to the tri-tip.  When you buy a tri-tip you can get it trimmed or untrimmed.  Getting it trimmed is nice, but more expensive and its not all that hard to trim it yourself.  Trimming it involves cutting the layer of fat off of one side of the meat.  When you trim it yourself you can decide how much of that fat you want.  If you don't care you can leave it all on there and let the fat get nice and crispy and let it drip into your meat to keep it moist and tender.  However, it can lead to flare-ups on your grill so keep an eye on it.  I typically trim off as much of the fat as I can see.

The next step is to marinate it.  You can just put a rub on it if you want, but I like when it soaks up all the flavors after a nice soak in a juicy bath.

I've got a couple different recipes for you to try out.

Spicy Tri-tip Marinade:

3 Tbsp chili powder
2 Tbsp unpacked brown sugar
2 Tbsp ground cumin
2 tsp garlic powder
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce

I typically make this recipe for a 2-3lb tri-tip.  If you've got a bigger piece of meat, then you'll obviously need to make more.  Let it marinate at least overnight, but the longer you let it sit, the more flavor you'll get.  The marinade makes a nice sauce to baste your tri-tip in while its on the grill, just be careful about letting that sugar burn.

Pappy's collection of seasonings.

Sweet Tri-tip Marinade
Pappy's Choice Seasoning
2 Tbsp Soy Sauce
2 Tbsp Worcestershire Sauce
juice from 2 limes

Cover that tri-tip in the Pappy's.  I mean cover it from end to end, on the sides, the top, the bottom, everywhere.  Make sure it is smothered in it.  Then put it in your marinating vessel (I use a ziploc bag).  Add the sauces and the lime.  I left this out for 1 hour at room temperature and it was just as tender and delicious as can be.  Using this recipe made the best tri-tip I have ever tasted.

If you're not in the mood to cook tri-tip, or just passing through, I recommend Firestone Grill in San Luis Obispo or Main Street Grill in Cambria.  I believe they are where I had my first tri-tip sandwiches on the Central Coast.  They give you a whole bunch of meat on a roll.  No fancy sauces, no vegetables, nothing to tarnish the delicousness that is tri-tip.  Most restaurants on the central coast have some kind of tri-tip on the menu.  Even SLO Pasty company has a tri-tip pasty!  Bet you won't find that in Wales.

My mom and sister said they can now find tri-tip cuts in their local grocery store in GA, so if you can't find it there, ask your butcher and I bet he can cut one. Then marinate it, grill it, and savor it.  It will be almost as good as vacationing here on the Central Coast!

The Best Burger I Never Ate

I am a big fan of the Food Network.  There's this show that comes on right about dinner time called The Best Thing I Ever Ate.  Now, usually the places on this show are in big towns.  New York, Chicago, Los Angeles, etc.  But on this one episode of the show, about Hidden Treasures, Cat Cora told of a place that was almost local.  The Hitching Post II in Buellton, CA.  Apparently they take all their weekend, uncooked beef and grind it into burger meat.  Filet Mignon, NY  Strip, all the best cuts into one of the most fantastic hamburgers man has ever created.  Add two strips of thick, crispy bacon and some avacado, and, according to Cat, you have burger perfection. However, they are only available Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, or until supplies last.

As I have mentioned before, Aaron is a huge fan of hamburgers.  So on Monday we decided to head down to Buellton after I got off work (this was already about 1 in the afternoon).  No problem though, its only about an hour and a half, and there is rarely traffic, and I have a new Droid 2 phone for entertainment purposes (ie. Sudoku  <3).  So we head down to Buellton.

If you're a link clicker, you may have noticed The Hitching Post is only open for dinner.  Starting at 5.  So imagine our surprise when we finally show up for these fantastic hamburgers only to have our dreams crushed at 2:30 in the afternoon.  What to do...

If you're not familiar with the Central Coast, let me take a moment to explain the size of these towns.  They are small.  Like, 1 movie theater with 6 screens, 3 grocery stores, and 1 Target (although Atascadero has none) small.  You can drive through the entire town in 10 minutes.  There aren't a lot of choices for wasting a few hours.  Plus, we now hadn't had lunch and it was 2:30.

Luckily, Aaron knew of a place called Jocko's in Nipomo.  We had passed through Nipomo on our way to Buellton and at this point, I was just hungry.  So North we went.

I was reading some reviews online and everyone was raving about Jocko's steaks.  Delicious, "the best on the central coast" and other high praises were the norm, so I had high hopes.  One of my favorite reviews mentioned that "you don't go to Jocko's for the decor" (Although, what restaurants do you go to for the decor?).  It's even funnier when you walk in and see the place with it's 70's cafeteria style chairs and fantastic gingham curtains.

However, once your steak arrives... you're not looking at anything else anyway.  Although I have relatively decent descriptive powers, i took a picture of this steak because I'm not sure how to describe it.  I ordered a (small) steak sandwich expecting sliced steak on a french roll kind of thing. To your right you will see the giant slab of meat on two pieces of french bread that they call their Steak Sandwich.  And by the way, there's a Large one.

The meat is fantastic though.  Tender, flavorful.  I was going to eat just half, but I couldn't stop eating it.  It was the simplest, most delicious steak sandwich I have ever tasted.

On their menus, Jocko's advertises they cook over oak coals out on a barbecue which you can see from one side of the restaurant.  Apparently, they don't cook lunch on those grills (Which are about the size of a twin bed), only dinner.  So I think that means another trip.

All in all, it wasn't a totally fail trip.  No burger, but we did get amazing steak.  And Steak is good too.

Jocko's Steakhouse
125 N Thompson Ave
Nipomo CA, 93444