Roasting Beef Tenderloin

Roasting Beef Tenderloin

Flavor: 3 Out Of 5

Alternative Names: Whole Filet, Filet Mignon, Chateaubriand

The tenderloin is a long cylindrical muscle cut from the middle of the cow right out of the short loin section. The muscle tissue does almost no work, so the tenderloin is the most tender piece of beef you can buy and because of this the most expensive.

Sold whole or as a smaller center cut roast, it has a pleasantly mild almost non-beefy flavor. Well recognized, beef tenderloin recipes are a favorite for entertaining.

We recommend cooking all beef roast at lower temperatures except for tenderloin roast. Most of the premium roast such as prime rib and strip loin, a lower temperature of 250 degrees works best. However we have found along with many other cooking experts that cooking beef tenderloin at a higher temperature of 425 degrees from start to finish had the same look and taste as the lower temperatures. So since there was no difference, you can cook a whole beef tenderloin roast in almost half the time.

How To Cook Beef Tenderloin

Roasting Beef Tenderloin

1. Remove the tenderloin roast from the refrigerator 1 hour before cooking to bring the meat to room temperature.

2. Trim and peel as much fat and skin as you can from the tenderloin if your butcher has not already done so. If you are cooking a whole tenderloin you will notice how it tapers down to a smaller thinner end (photo). In order to have the roast cook more evenly tuck about 5-6 inches of the small end under the rest of the tenderloin (photo) and at 1-2 inch intervals tie the roast with kitchen string or butchers twine.

Photo on left is a whole beef tenderloin. Photo on right the small end is folded under the roast and tied with twine at 1-2 inch intervals to give the roast a more uniform shape to help cook the tenderloin more evenly.

Below is a cooking chart for roasting beef tenderloin. You should always use an instant-read thermometer to check the doneness of a roast.

Doneness	Description	Meat Thermometer Reading
Rare	Red with cold, soft center	125-130 degrees
Medium-Rare	Red with warm, somewhat firm center	135-140 degrees
Medium	Pink and firm throughout	140-150 degrees
Medium-well	Pink line in center, quite firm	150-155 degrees
Well-done	Gray-brown throughout and completely firm	160-165 degrees

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