Cardiff crack? a secret marinade

[Ray]

Hi Pit Boss and fellow club members. I recently enjoyed (understatement) a tri tip marinaded in something called Cardiff crack. Anyone ever heard of it? Know the recipe? is the marinade injected? Never had a tri tip be so tender and juicy.

Ray

[Henrik]

I found this one after a quick search on the Internet. It is a close approximation, could this be it?

http://www.maxgigicare.com/cardiff-crack-grilled-roast/

It seems to be semi-secret, Wikipedia has some references:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cardiff_Crack

[David Parrish]

So I clicked that first link and saw this ingredient, "1 to 2 cups of dry red wine (can be leftover wine from last week)"

When does that ever happen? lol

[Huskee]

No kidding.

[fzxdoc]

I'm so going to try this recipe on my Pit Barrel Cooker. I just got a Tri-Tip at my local EarthFare market. I hope it tastes as good as it sounds.

Thanks Henrik and Ray,
Kathryn

[David Parrish]

Hi Pit Boss and fellow club members. I recently enjoyed (understatement) a tri tip marinaded in something called Cardiff crack. Anyone ever heard of it? Know the recipe? is the marinade injected? Never had a tri tip be so tender and juicy.

Ray

Hey Ray welcome to The Pit! When you have a moment check out this thread, especially tip #1. It'll tell you how to complete your signature.

Thanks for sharing this "secret".

@Fzxdoc please let us know how it turns out!

[Huskee]

Greetings Ray, and thanks for stimulating a discussion here on your first post. Pit Boss gave you some orders, and here's another: head over to the Introduce Yourself page and give us a little bio about yourself and what you like to cook, what you hope to master, etc. When you have time. Enjoy life here in The Pit!

[Ray]

Thanks to everyone for the responses and friendly "welcome to the club"! I also checked out the website that Henrik noted and the recipe is pretty straightforward. But the tenderness is what surprised us. My wife did some further research on this and discovered a tenderizing process that is used commercially called vacuum tumbling. We believe that Seaside Market in Cardiff, CA may use this technique. I can't wait to hear back from fzxdoc (aka Kathryn) to find out how her tri tip turns out. But for now, looks like I've got some homework to do! Later...

Ray

[Marauderer]

Hi Ray, Welcome to the "Pit Nation". What a grand start. I look forward to your Posts and Pics.

[Deuce]

Hi Ray, welcome to the Pit. Thanks for sharing that Tri tip, looks like something I want to do. This is a great place to meet fellow enthusiast and to share tips and techniques.

Kathryn looking forward to seeing how it comes out on the PBC. Tri Tip is on my PBC bucket list

[Marauderer]

I think this is their real secret. I have an idea of how I will do this to try it and will post it below this article.

Vacuum marinator tumbler. Necessity or luxury?

Published by ohioequipment
December 7, 2012 ^. 4.8K Views ^. 1 Comment ^. 3 Votes
Vacuum Tumbler (Marinators) manufacturer's advertise their machinery as: "Nothing beats the flavor of meat marinaded in a Vacuum Tumbler. Under vacuum the meat expands and becomes more porous, allowing the marinade to penetrate deeper than soaking. The gentle tumbling action of the drum coupled with tumbler marinades tenderizes the meat as it’s marinating."
Upon purchasing couple of Luco brand machines on local auction, I decided to familiarize myself with operating process and outcome of vacuum tumbling/marination process. Briefly after starting collecting/reading few on-line / library articles, researches and forum discussions I got faced with following questions:
Is it the vacuum? Does vacuum produces increase of more than 2 percent "take-up rate," as 2% is standard quantity of absorption you would get by marinating without machinery (home marination)? Or is it the constant agitation in a slowly revolving drum that does a trick?
It is well known fact that (in attempt to increase the take-up rate) commercial meat packers do their marinating in a commercial vacuum tumbler. They claim that mechanically tumbling the meat and the marinade in a rotating vacuum container with paddles breaks up and stretches out the protein fibers, increasing the meat's ability to absorb the liquid.
Then I came over excellent (and impartial) USDA research by Smith, Douglas and Young, Louis that was submitted to European Symposium on Quality of Poultry Meat in 2005. The research is called: THE EFFECT OF PRESSURE AND PHOSPHATES ON YIELD, SHEAR, AND COLOR OF MARINATED BROILER BREAST MEAT. Below is summary of research, please, take a moment and check it for yourself:
Interpretive Summary: As much as 50% of the broiler chicken meat produced will be marinated in some form prior to consumption. Typical commercial marinades are made of water, salt, and phosphates, and this is added to the chicken meat in a large rotating barrel-like tumbler. During tumbling, vacuum pressure is applied, as it helps the marinade to penetrate into the meat. This marination process may improve yield, decrease weepage in the package, improve tenderness, and lighten the color somewhat of the white meat. There are questions, however, of exactly how the phosphates in the marination solution interact with the vacuum pressure to provide these benefits. Also, some individuals in the US prefer, and some country’s regulations require that phosphates not be added to chicken meat. For these reasons this experiment was designed to determine the role of phosphate marinades, vacuum pressure, and their interaction on meat quality. Results show that the use of phosphates greatly increases cook yield (which probably would also improve juiciness of the meat) and slightly lightened the meat. Vacuum pressure during tumbling was no better than a lack of pressure (other than normal atmospheric pressure) or the opposite of vacuum, positive pressure. Pressure, either vacuum or positive, also does not interact with phosphates to either improve or decrease meat quality. Phosphates in marinades are important for cooked meat yield, but there is no reason to apply vacuum pressure during tumbling.
Technical Abstract: A significant portion of raw poultry meat in the U.S. is marinated prior to consumption, usually with a mixture of water, salt, and phosphates that are vacuum tumbled with the meat. This study was designed to determine whether pressure, phosphate, or both were responsible for the increase in marinated weight and retention during cooking after marination. In each of three replicate trials, 60 broiler breast fillets were assigned to tumbler vessels with pressures equivalent to either vacuum (381 mm Hg below ambient, VT), ambient (AT), or positive (PT, 776 mm Hg above ambient), with or without phosphate in the marination solution (added at 15% by weight to raw meat weight - either 91% water, 6% salt, and 3% phosphate or 94% water and 6% salt, respectively) in a 3X2 design. All tumblers were operated at 15 RPM for 20 min at a temperature of 30 C. Raw fillets were weighed, color measured via colorimeter, marinated, stored 1 h, reweighed, cooked, reweighed, color re-measured, held overnight, and two strips per fillet sheared via the Warner-Bratzler method (WBSHR). Phosphate had no significant (P<0.05) effect on % marinade uptake; the type of pressure application was significant, however, as AT (12.8%) samples picked up more marinade than PT (11.4%), but neither was different from VT (12.0%). There was no effect of pressure or phosphate on % drip loss (mean = –1.06%). For cook yield, there was no effect due to pressure treatment; phosphate, however, significantly increased yield (86.1 vs. 76.6%). For WBSHR, kg force to shear for VT (9.2) was higher than either PT (5.6) or AT (5.5) for the phosphate treatment, but shear force for PT (9.3) was higher than VT (6.0) or AT (6.2) for the non-phosphate treatment. There were no differences in raw color due to pressure or phosphate treatments, but phosphate increased cooked L* from 70.6 to 71.6, and decreased cooked a* from 1.57 to 0.95 (no practical significance). Overall, the type of pressure application during tumbling has no effect on % drip loss, cook yield, or color values, and only minor effect on % marinade uptake, and the major effect obtained with phosphate is increase in yield. Based on these data, processors may improve yield with phosphate in marination where allowed, but vacuum pressure during tumbling provides no advantage compared to ambient or positive pressure.
Thank you for reading & hope this helps you make educated purchasing decision.

I will tenderize the meat first



and then marinade it in a bag and work at getting as much air out as possible and then will knead it 3-4X/day for 2 days and then cook at 200*F until an IT of 115*F and then reverse sear to an IT of 125*F. I am betting it will be really close to the original

[Ray]

Hey Barry,

Can you explain what the device is that is pictured above? I've never seen one, much less used one! Also, is reverse searing better than the traditional "sear first, low cook after" method? Thanks,

Ray

[Marauderer]

It is a hand meat tenderizer. Link below.

http://www.amazon.com/Jaccard-200348-Supertendermatic-48-Blade-Tenderizer/dp/B001347JK6/ref=sr_1_1?s=kitchen&ie=UTF8&qid=1412114032&sr=1-1&keywords=meat+tenderizer

[mgaretz]

Not a good plan Barry. The jacquard will push whatever surface bacteria are on the meat down into the center. Cooking to an IT that low is not sufficent to kill whatever will have grown inside.

[Marauderer]

Not a good plan Barry. The jacquard will push whatever surface bacteria are on the meat down into the center. Cooking to an IT that low is not sufficent to kill whatever will have grown inside.

So Mark, I tend to like my beef rare and you are telling me that I shouldn't eat it rare or that I shouldn't tine it or both. I am not trying to be combative and want to fully understand where you are coming from so I can make an informed decision on what I want to do.

[mgaretz]

I like mine rare too. Searing the outside as well as most normal cooking will kill the bacteria on the surface as it gets plenty hot. The inside of the muscle stays sterile, so cooking to rare inside is not usually a problem. But when you move the surface bacteria to the inside, like with your tines or like with ground beef, then you should make sure the IT reaches 165f or so, otherwise the bacteria and/or toxins will still be active. In your plan it's worse because you wanted to jacquard and then wait many days before cooking, giving the internal bacteria a chance to multiply. So bottom line, cooking to rare with solid muscle is pretty safe as long as the surface temps are high at some point in the cook.

[Ray]

So Mark, I think that you're recommending not using the Jaccard tenderizer unless you cook the meat to an internal temp of at least 165F, which in this case would take the tri tip well beyond medium rare. What about other techniques to tenderize, like kneading? Any risk of bacteria intrusion?

Ray

[mgaretz]

I have no idea if kneading would do any good, and unless the meat is massaging me back, I'm not massaging it!

[Ray]

Got it! I actually prefer other methods of tenderizing but usually steer clear of MSG.

Ray

[Ray]

Barry,

Let us know how your tenderizing/marinade technique works. Sounds well thought out.

Ray

[Marauderer]

I found an inexpensive vacuum tumbler and have ordered one.

Check it out.

http://pitmaster.amazingribs.com/forum/accessorize-your-pit/64553-ags-countertop-meat-tumbler

[Ray]

Marauderer That's a great idea, Barry. My wife is currently in California, expects to visit Seaside market in Cardiff prior to returning, and to pack at least three frozen Cardiff Crack marinaded Tri-tip roasts for the return trip to Indiana! Can't wait to cook 'em up.