Al Frugoni's Grilled Tri-Tip recipe on Fatherly.com
Currently one of cooking world’s most prominent open fire grilling experts, Al Frugoni blends Argentinian and American barbecue cultures to teach his 1.3 million TikTok followers the joys of asado and inspire them in their own cooking adventures. His crawfish empanadas and creative takes on burgers are fun cross-cultural mashups, though when he’s cooking asado for his family and neighbors in Texas, he’s usually enjoying a more traditional selection like grilled tri-tip with chimichurri sauce.
Fugoni finds the steak-like tri-tip roast an ideal cut when cooking for groups, and it certainly helps that it’s less expensive than other premium cuts of beef.
“Tri-tip is a high-quality beef cut that weighs about two pounds. You can cook it whole, so it keeps more of the juices inside until you slice it, which makes it taste better than some other cuts,” he tells Fatherly. “And while tri-tip is tender, it also has a lot of muscular fat and a good layer of fat on one side. That helps protect the meat when cooking it directly over a hot fire and adds great flavor.”