My First Smoked Beef Tenderloin For Christmas Dinner

We hope you had a wonderful Christmas and we had a nice, albeit warm, one that required opening up the house to avoid using the AC.

I love, and have made, smoked prime rib for Christmas dinner several times but Bev does not like all of the fat in the ribeye so an idea hit me.  Her favorite beef cut is tenderloin so I decided to try smoking a whole tenderloin roast for this year’s Christmas meal.

Our diners were Eliza and family, Joe and Carol Howell, Pat (SIL), and, special treat granddaughter, Madison who flew in from Charleston, SC.  Our menu for the meal was salad, smoked beef tenderloin, twice baked potato casserole, Beanie’s famous cranberry salad, homemade focaccia bread and desserts.

I bought a whole packer beef tenderloin - it actually came packaged as two butt ends which was even better and following is my recipe.  There are actually three lightly connected muscles on the butt end with fat and silver skin between them and the easiest thing to do is just cut off the smaller ones.  But since the meat is the same on all of them, a little careful knife work can allow them all to be included with the roast after tying.

Smoked Beef Tenderloin

Ingredients:

7 lb beef tenderloin still in the packing house wrapping

Yellow mustard

Steak Seasoning

Instructions:

Remove beef from package and rinse under cold water.

Trim to remove the fat and silver skin from the roast surface then between the muscles.

Tie it to hold the shape and maximize meat use with the side muscles.

Brush on a light coat of yellow mustard to hold the seasoning.

Season liberally with salt and the Steak Seasoning (I put none on the ends).

Let rest at room temperature for a few hours.

Preheat smoker to 225F.

Add the roasts to the smoker with the thickest part toward the center and laying on the side muscles.

Smoke to an internal roast temp of 120F. (took about 1 1/2 hours)

Remove from the smoker and wrap tightly in foil.

Add to a 125F toaster oven until 15 minutes prior to serving.

Put in a 450F oven for about 10 minutes to develop a crust.

Remove from the oven to a cutting board and cut into ½” slices. (I got too busy serving and forgot the pics)

For those wanting there meat more done, I dunked it into a pan of simmering au jus for a few seconds to achieve the desired color.

Prior to the meal we had a cheese ball with crackers, sparkling Italian wine, and Wende’s homemade eggnog. Then we began the meal with salad and Bev’s homemade focaccia bread then sided the meat with delicious twice baked potato casserole, cranberry salad, and more bread.

Steak Seasoning

My plan was to use Montreal Steak Seasoning on the beef but I didn’t have enough and Food City didn’t carry it so I decided to improvise.  I had almost a half cup of Montreal so I mixed it with a single recipe of the steak seasoning from the “Ask Chef Dennis” blog.  Before mixing, I ran the Montreal, thyme, and black pepper thru a spice grinder.  I omitted the salt from the blend and added it to the meat separately and I omitted the brown sugar.

Easy Au Jus (No Drippings Needed)

For those who wanted their meat to be less red, I gave it a quick dunk is simmering jus using a double recipe from “Drive Me Hungry.”  Then some folks topped their meat with a spoonful of jus.

Mushroom Sauce for Steak

I also made a mushroom sauce for use as a meat topping using the recipe from Crème De La Crumb.

This is my plate.

We finished the meal with Carol's lemon pie and Wende's pumpkin cobbler both of which were delicious.

The Verdict:

Cooking the tenderloin this way worked great and the meat seemed to be a big hit, especially with Bev.  While I still prefer the flavor of the rib roast, the tenderloin was an excellent alternative.

This made for a very busy day and I went to bed at 8pm so I'm already rethinking next year's Christmas.

Photos can be slightly enlarged by clicking on them and the blue words are links.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

12/25/25 event date