- Dec 23, 2014
- 78
- 12
By attempt, I mean failure. Even though it was the best brisket I've made and beats a few (bad) restaurants I've tried, it was nowhere near close to brisket Nirvana
I will probably answer my own questions here, but I would love some insight from the seasoned smokers
I used a combo of briquettes and lump charcoal and wood chunks, since I don't have access to wood splits. I pretty much filled the (20x20 DIY) charcoal basket and I would guess it was about 2.5x weber chimney fulls to start with...i only used a very small water pan and didn't refill
my temps at the grate were pretty constant initially at 262 F, and the brisket temp climbed to about 149 F after about 3-4 hours. It then stalled and my pit temps also dropped, so I added another chimney of lit briquettes/charcoal
after about an hour still at 149 i decided to wrap using on layer of butcher paper. that was the first time i opened the pit.
the temps then climbed to about 182 after a few more hours and an addition or two of more briquettes and lump charcoal
brisket remained at 182 for 2 hours, and during this time i noticed a lot of liquid very very slowly exiting the smoker drain, about 12oz to begin with, then another 6 or so
so i believe i didn't wrap the brisket sufficiently, which allowed all the moisture to escape and i ended up with an uncooked and slightly dry brisket. the point was somewhat good so i separated it from the flat and then wrapped the flat in foil and into the oven at 300 because it wasn't buttery at all. i took it out at 208 because i forgot about it. it was a lot softer than before, but i may have overcooked it a tad
back to when i was smoking.... i did get a lot of temp drops as my fuel burned out, so i suppose i need to be using a lot more fuel and refilling more often. the thing is, it seems to be wasting a lot of fuel, i don't know how much fuel others burn when cooking a brisket, but it seems to be very expensive
i think next time i will either try wrapping in two layers of butcher paper or just use heavy duty foil, i feel like a lot of the moisture escapes near where the probe is and i'm not sure what to do about that. i also had a hard time properly wrapping in butcher paper
i reheated (more like warmed) some slices of the flat the next day in the microwave and they came out pretty decent
I will probably answer my own questions here, but I would love some insight from the seasoned smokers
I used a combo of briquettes and lump charcoal and wood chunks, since I don't have access to wood splits. I pretty much filled the (20x20 DIY) charcoal basket and I would guess it was about 2.5x weber chimney fulls to start with...i only used a very small water pan and didn't refill
my temps at the grate were pretty constant initially at 262 F, and the brisket temp climbed to about 149 F after about 3-4 hours. It then stalled and my pit temps also dropped, so I added another chimney of lit briquettes/charcoal
after about an hour still at 149 i decided to wrap using on layer of butcher paper. that was the first time i opened the pit.
the temps then climbed to about 182 after a few more hours and an addition or two of more briquettes and lump charcoal
brisket remained at 182 for 2 hours, and during this time i noticed a lot of liquid very very slowly exiting the smoker drain, about 12oz to begin with, then another 6 or so
so i believe i didn't wrap the brisket sufficiently, which allowed all the moisture to escape and i ended up with an uncooked and slightly dry brisket. the point was somewhat good so i separated it from the flat and then wrapped the flat in foil and into the oven at 300 because it wasn't buttery at all. i took it out at 208 because i forgot about it. it was a lot softer than before, but i may have overcooked it a tad
back to when i was smoking.... i did get a lot of temp drops as my fuel burned out, so i suppose i need to be using a lot more fuel and refilling more often. the thing is, it seems to be wasting a lot of fuel, i don't know how much fuel others burn when cooking a brisket, but it seems to be very expensive
i think next time i will either try wrapping in two layers of butcher paper or just use heavy duty foil, i feel like a lot of the moisture escapes near where the probe is and i'm not sure what to do about that. i also had a hard time properly wrapping in butcher paper
i reheated (more like warmed) some slices of the flat the next day in the microwave and they came out pretty decent
