All this talk of chuckies lately made me want one! I've never smoked a chuck, or any beef for that matter. I've done lots of ribs and pulled pork though. I did a ton of reading through the archives here and here's what I ended up with:
I've always had to reload my smoker with more charcoal every couple hours in the past, and I have been reading up on the minion method. I failed before at it, so I wanted to try again but a little differently. I loaded up my charcoal tray (I need to build a basket) as you can see in the pictures. I put a few chunks of Mesquite, and I had just a few apple chips left so I threw those on. I started about 1/3 of a chimney worth of charcoal and added it to the lower right hand side of the pile. I kept my vents pretty open for a while, until temps got up to about 175 then I closed it down quite a bit. It took me longer to get up to 225ish than normal. However, with a few minor adjustments here and there, once it reached temp I didn't have to load it for almost the entire cook (about 7hrs). It was incredible. It cruised at about 230 all day long with no adjusting needed. I was really happy about that.
Here is the chuckie goin in....simple salt and pepper. Nothing else.
coming out of the smoker
sliced up and ready to eat.
First off....it tasted outstanding. salt, pepper, smoke, beef. simple and good.
But that leads me to my next question. I see most of you guys end up with pulled beef from a chuck, kinda like pulled pork. This one would have taken some work to pull. Just wasn't quite there. It was very tender, just not fall apart tender. I smoked it at roughly 230ish for 7 hrs. Temp was at 185, I poked with a toothpick and it seemed tough still. I added a few hot coals and bumped the temp up to about 250-260 for a little bit, (the wife was getting hungry). I checked again at 192 and it still felt pretty firm. I pulled it at 198, placed it in a pan and wrapped with foil, then a bunch of towels and into a cooler to sit for a bit while I finished up other stuff. I knew it needed to rest. It rested for about 30-40 minutes. There wasn't really any caryover cooking to speak of. The temp slowly dropped until I got it out and sliced it up.
It sliced up really well, was very tender, but not pulled beef sorta tender. thoughts on why that was? Did it need to go longer?
Also, it seemed to have some inconsistent fat distribution (my theory). the places that had good fat were amazing. The fat just melted in your mouth....heaven in a bite. Other places seemed dry, like there wasn't any fat at all in that part. Is this common with a chuck?
Also, I never foiled it like I've seen some guys do. Just closed the door and let it roll.
Thoughts?
I've always had to reload my smoker with more charcoal every couple hours in the past, and I have been reading up on the minion method. I failed before at it, so I wanted to try again but a little differently. I loaded up my charcoal tray (I need to build a basket) as you can see in the pictures. I put a few chunks of Mesquite, and I had just a few apple chips left so I threw those on. I started about 1/3 of a chimney worth of charcoal and added it to the lower right hand side of the pile. I kept my vents pretty open for a while, until temps got up to about 175 then I closed it down quite a bit. It took me longer to get up to 225ish than normal. However, with a few minor adjustments here and there, once it reached temp I didn't have to load it for almost the entire cook (about 7hrs). It was incredible. It cruised at about 230 all day long with no adjusting needed. I was really happy about that.
Here is the chuckie goin in....simple salt and pepper. Nothing else.
coming out of the smoker
sliced up and ready to eat.
First off....it tasted outstanding. salt, pepper, smoke, beef. simple and good.
But that leads me to my next question. I see most of you guys end up with pulled beef from a chuck, kinda like pulled pork. This one would have taken some work to pull. Just wasn't quite there. It was very tender, just not fall apart tender. I smoked it at roughly 230ish for 7 hrs. Temp was at 185, I poked with a toothpick and it seemed tough still. I added a few hot coals and bumped the temp up to about 250-260 for a little bit, (the wife was getting hungry). I checked again at 192 and it still felt pretty firm. I pulled it at 198, placed it in a pan and wrapped with foil, then a bunch of towels and into a cooler to sit for a bit while I finished up other stuff. I knew it needed to rest. It rested for about 30-40 minutes. There wasn't really any caryover cooking to speak of. The temp slowly dropped until I got it out and sliced it up.
It sliced up really well, was very tender, but not pulled beef sorta tender. thoughts on why that was? Did it need to go longer?
Also, it seemed to have some inconsistent fat distribution (my theory). the places that had good fat were amazing. The fat just melted in your mouth....heaven in a bite. Other places seemed dry, like there wasn't any fat at all in that part. Is this common with a chuck?
Also, I never foiled it like I've seen some guys do. Just closed the door and let it roll.
Thoughts?