Elliott Moss' Pit Beef

Ingredients

• Meat: 4-5 lbs top round
• Rub: 1/2 cup ground coffee mixed with 1/2 cup ground pepper
• Brine: Beef Brine (Elliott recommends the brine from Book of Smoke)
• Sauce: Pit Beef Sauce (included below and from Book of Smoke)

Method

1. Brine the beef overnight just before you smoke it. On smoking day, rub it until it's heavily coated with the black pepper and coffee.
2. Now, keep in mind that you're basically making roast beef in a smoker. This means you'll need to pay close attention if you want it to be a perfect medium rare.
3. Smoke the meat at about 200°F until the meat reaches 145°F internally. It depends on the size of your roast and how well you hold temperature, but it will be somewhere in between 2 and 4 hours. If you have the patience, you can add additional smoke flavor by smoking the beef at a lower temperature. By lowering the temperature smoker to 180°F or so, you can add an additional hour or two of smoking time.
4. Once the beef reaches temperature, pull it off, let it rest, then slice thin and serve. If you're not eating it right away or saving it for the leftovers, refrigerate the beef. You'll find this also makes it easier to slice very thin, if that's your thing.
5. If you want to recreate the Buxton sandwich and you're using cold sliced beef, use a sauté pan to heat up the beef and coat it with as much or as little of the Pit Beef Sauce as you'd like. Serve on a pan-toasted white roll with horseradish sauce on one side.