Southwestern Smoked Chuck Roast
This Southwestern Smoked Chuck Roast is a perfect way to make shredded beef with a nice smoky flavor for burritos, tacos, nachos, rice bowls, and more.
For this smoked chuck roast recipe I took a unique approach to smoking roasts that produces juicy chunks of shredded beef with a rich, smoky flavor that cuts the cooking time almost in half from traditional recipes.
Highlights
This unique Southwestern Smoked Chuck Roast recipe uses a four hour smoke and a short stint in a pressure cooker to create juicy chunks of shredded beef that are perfect for tacos, burritos, and rice bowls.
Content
There are a lot of recipes for smoking chuck roasts that will be served as barbecue. What I wanted was shredded beef that was easily pulled into large chunks, had smokey Southwestern flavors, didn’t take all day to make, and could be turned into pulled beef for some unbelievably tasty tacos and burritos.
The secret to making it all work is using a set time in the smoker, a short stint in a pressure cooker filled with dried chilies, and a special finishing touch to make the flavors pop.
Smoking Beef Chuck Roast
When it comes to smoking beef roasts, different types of roasts can be divided into two groups. The roast beef group includes top and bottom, eye of round, sirloin, and tri-trip roasts. These cuts excel at being smoked low and slow and sliced thin for sandwiches or served at parties. Use our classic Smoked Beef Roast recipe for these cuts.
The second group consists of chuck roasts and brisket that take longer to smoke and are a fantastic choice for barbecues. These cuts are well marbled and excel at absorbing the smoke flavor from long cooking times that allow the fat and connective tissue to break down, creating tender, juicy beef with deep, beefy flavors.
For a deep dive into other cuts of beef, along with a time and temperature guide, read Tips and Tricks for the Best Beef to Smoke.
Over the past few years, I’ve been eating more and more delicious Southwestern and Mexican dishes made with shredded beef that are often made with smoked brisket that is so tender and juicy that it falls apart at the slightest touch. Making a great brisket is one thing at a restaurant or for a big party. It’s another thing for weeknight dinners.
The best cut of meat for the shredded beef I craved was a chuck roast. It’s a good choice because it’s readily available, comes in reasonable sizes, and has beautiful marbling. I already knew from our Instant Pot Pot Roast recipe that it breaks apart into large chunks with an almost divine texture when cooked right.
Time + Temperature
For this recipe to work I needed to figure out how to cook the chuck roast to the point it starts to fall apart, but not so far that it starts to dry out. This can be a real challenge when smoking roasts.
Traditionally, smoked chuck roast recipes are focused on making poor man’s brisket, where the meat is seasoned primarily with salt and pepper, smoked to an internal temperature between 195℉ (91℃) to 200℉ (93℃), sliced thin, and served with barbecue sauce.
The challenge to smoking chuck roasts is they can take a long time to smoke and often stall out at around 160℉ (71℃). Time can be an even bigger concern for roasts that will be pulled or shredded where the internal temperature needs to reach at least 205℉ (96℃) before the meat starts to pull apart easily.
In my early tests, I found that getting a 3.5 to 4 lb roast up to 205℉ (96℃) took 10 to 12 hours of smoke time. To move it along, I tried a bunch of different things, including using smoking temperatures of 250℉ (121℃) and 275℉ (135℃) and smoke braising it in a cast iron pan with a braising liquid that included dried chilies, sauteéd onions, and the liquid used for rehydrating the chilies.
Smoke braising, where you smoke the meat in a braising liquid, produced the chili flavor I was looking for and created a lovely cooking liquid that could be mixed with the shredded meat, but it still took forever to finish smoking.
The problem was that the roasts would often stall out twice, once when they were around 160℉ (71℃) and again when they reached 200℉ (93℃). A stall is where the internal temperature of the meat reaches a specific temperature and stays there for a long time. It’s a normal part of smoking large cuts of meat, but it can be infuriating when you’re continually checking to see if a roast is done.
One way to overcome this problem is to wrap the roast in pink butcher paper when it reaches 160℉ (71℃), which isn’t a big deal if you’re looking for a finished roast that will be sliced like brisket, but it wasn’t helping us get the meat to the fall apart stage in a reasonable amount of time.
The general guidelines for smoking chuck roasts are 2 hours per pound at 225℉ (107℃) and 1-1/2 hours per pound at 250℉ (121℃), along with at least 30 minutes of resting time wrapped in pink butcher paper or aluminum foil.
This meant that a 4 lb roast could take 9 to 10 hours of prep, cooking, and finishing before everything was shredded and ready to eat.
A Faster Smoked Roast
Over the years, I’ve found that most of the flavor from smoking is delivered during the early part of the smoking process, and the total time spent in the smoker has more to do with getting the meat to a specific internal temperature or a level of doneness.
I’ve also found that a simple way to break down roasts for shredding is to use a pressure cooker. The intense pressure breaks down the collagen and structure so the meat stays supple and juicy using a relatively short cooking time. And it does it while infusing the flavors from the cooking liquid into the meat.
The idea of using a combination of smoker and Instant Pot came to me one night around midnight when I finally gave up on a roast that wasn’t quite there and decided the only way to finish it and get some sleep was to throw it into an Instant Pot.
As sleepy as I was, shredding the chunks of meat that came out of the pressure cooker that night made it clear that combining the two techniques was the way to go for this recipe.
After a few more batches, I found that four hours in the smoker and forty minutes in the pressure cooker produced the intensely flavored, incredibly juicy smoked beef I was looking for, and that would be perfect for rice bowls, burritos, and more.
Using a combination of smoking and pressure cooking is the best way to make amazing smoked and shredded beef in an afternoon.
What makes this approach work so well is the chuck roast smokes long enough to develop a deep smokey flavor with a beautiful smoke ring while you get the certainty of planning your day around set cooking times.
While this recipe doesn’t require monitoring the roast’s internal temperature, using a wireless meat thermometer to track its progress in the smoker can still be helpful.
Building Bold Southwestern Flavors
Every step in this recipe is designed to infuse bold, Southwestern flavors into the meat. It starts with slicing the roast into two or three large chunks to create more surface area for the dry rub and smoke to penetrate the meat. This can also be used to generate more bark on a roast.
Our Southwest Spice Blend combines ancho chilies, ground chipotle, Mexican oregano, and other spices and herbs from the Southwest that give the region its unique flavors.
Using a pressure cooker to finish the chuck roast provides an opportunity to build layers of flavor by infusing the meat with aromatics and dried chilies. Using the liquid the chilies were rehydrated in amplifies those flavors and creates a rich sauce that helps keep the meat tender and juicy.
A secret we discovered for giving shredded meat dishes, like this Pulled Pork, a burst of flavor is to reserve a teaspoon or two of the seasoning until after the meat has been shredded.
What to Make with Shredded Beef
There are so many delicious ways to use smoked chuck roast. The simplest is to slice and serve it as it is, which is perfect for barbecues.
Our favorite thing to make is burritos with shredded beef, white rice, pico de gallo, some good cheese, and sour cream wrapped up in a large, lightly toasted tortilla.
The shredded meat can be used to make tacos with all sorts of different toppings, from the traditional cilantro and onion combination to lightly pickled watermelon and feta cheese. I love making rice bowls with it using Mexican Rice, grilled peppers, and Pinto Beans with Dried Chilies.
Try tossing some pulled beef with sauteéd shitake mushrooms and a good instant ramen for a quick lunch. The meat and mushrooms elevate and enrich the broth, creating a scrumptious bowl of ramen.
Shredded beef also makes excellent sandwiches or sliders for parties. Make sure to toast the buns and top the filling with Ancho Chili and Honey Barbecue Sauce and some lightly pickled red onion for crunch.
The best way to reheat smoked chuck roast is on the stove over low heat until it’s warmed through. Microwaving also works for smaller amounts. Smoked chuck roast will keep in an airtight container in the fridge for a week to ten days and can be frozen for six to nine months.
Southwestern Smoked Chuck Roast
Ingredients
- 3.5 lb beef chuck roast
- 4 tsp Southwest Spice Blend, divided
- 1/2 white onion, medium, sliced thin
- 2 garlic cloves, sliced thin
- 1 4 oz can roasted green chilies
- 1 ancho chili pepper, dried
- 1 chipotle chili pepper, dried
- 1 guajillo chili, dried
Instructions
- Cut the chuck roast into 2 or 3 large pieces and coat the outside with 3 tsp of the spice blend.3.5 lb beef chuck roast, 4 tsp Southwest Spice Blend
- Smoke the chuck roast at 225℉ (107℃) for 4 hours.
- While the chuck roast is smoking, rehydrate the poblano, chipotle, and guillaja chili peppers in 3 cups of hot water for 30 minutes.1 ancho chili pepper, 1 chipotle chili pepper, 1 guajillo chili
- Once the chilies have been hydrated, remove them from the liquid, cut out the stems, and dice. Reserve 2 cups of the liquid.
- When the chuck roast has finished smoking, remove it from the smoker and let it rest while preparing the pressure cooker.
- Set the pressure cooker to the meat setting. Saute the onions, garlic, roasted green chilies, and diced chilies in a small bit of olive oil until they have started to soften. Add the pieces of chuck roast and 2 cups of the steeping liquid. Cook under high pressure for 40 minutes and use a natural release.1/2 white onion, 2 garlic cloves, 1 4 oz can roasted green chilies
- Remove the chunks of meat from the pressure cooker and shred them into bite-sized pieces. We generally use a large fork and a pair of tongs.
- Once the chuck roast has been shredded, mix it with the remaining seasoning and enough cooking liquid to keep the tender meat moist but not so much that it’s runny.
Mark is an experienced food writer, recipe developer, and photographer who is also Umami’s publisher and CEO. A passionate cook who loves to cook for friends, he can often be found in the kitchen or by the grill testing new recipes.
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