Basic Brisket Smoke

[oldschoolbbq]

  Well,of course I'm gonna put in my .02 worth

  I was raised in Texas and have smoked a lot of Brisket(yeah,another way-and just another variation to think about trying).I am a wood burner,yeah I start with gas,but it's quicker and I'm old

.I also have a fairly large Backyard Smoker:

  My SFB can be fed without opening the cooking chamber. I begin with a large amount of my odd wood(knots,ends,pieces) to develope a nice bed of embers, and the pit is to my chosen heat. I then rub my Brisket with S/CBP ,maybe some Garlic, and put it in with the point end toward the SFB and Fat up,shut the lid and leave it shut for 1.5hrs. per pound of raw meat.No peeking.Why? I feel inside the Cooking chamber is a athmosphere the is caused by the Heat,Pressure and Moisture (created in the Chamber due to the dripping juice) ; if I were to open my lid,I would lose a lot of time and all it's atmosphere would have to build back up(done by adding more fuel to increase heat)and most likley have a big temperature spike that would mean more juice will be used to make moisture,time wasted from the loss and fuel you unwittingly used when all would have needed was to ckack the FB and see if you had embers or need fuel.

  Done right(watching your Grill level therms.?),or probe at that level and placement) will help in decerning if you need fuel or not.When the grate level therm. drops 10* to 20*f,look and add a bit of wood. Had you heated it on the top of the SFB , it would virtually ignite on contact; this means less or NO white smoke-only TBS.Takes practice , but is a proven method for stick/wood burning Smokers.

   You will lose no moisture in leaving it in until time calculation and a better Bark will develope.Be very patient and hold the temp. at around200*to 225*(I say that because unless you have a set and forget,a steady heat control can't be managed. A few degrees change is OK,but the big50*,80* or 100*f jumps are not what I call steady; and I never wrap until it OUT of the  Smoker!!!

  Having reached the end of time,check with a tooth pick or slender probe.When uit goes in and slide out easily,you are finished

  I really hope this helps.

Stan   aka   oldschool

 

[oldschoolbbq]

   When you go looking for a brisket,look for a Cryovaced packer which can be (reasonably) bent in the middle-holding both ends,this will make choosing a good one less a shot in the dark,This one will have somewhat leff connective tissues and collegen between the muscle fibers.

   Now,IMHO, I start mine in a pre-heated smoker at 200*to250*f them add the Salt/Cracked Black Pepper coating,nothing else

,some good smoke producing substance,and leave the door SHUT for a period of 1.5hrs./lb. of raw meat.

This keep the heat, pressure and moisture in the meat.No need to wrap in foil or baste/spray or anything; just "Patience"

  Soon you wil be doing this more and more...

sorry no shots of finished Brisky,but,

T

   These are the type brisket you want,and they do great

Have fun and...

 

[dog1234]

Doing my first brisket and ribs now.......................... I trimmed and coated the meat with wor sause, mustard and Jeff Rub, last night. Light the smoker at 7 and put the meat on at 8. It looks like you oldschool lay them fat side up???????????

I hear different ways....... I assume you like them this way?????????

 

[larry hensley]

Still need to do Brisket been kinda intimidated by it. 

 

[larry hensley]

I read a lot about foiling. Would it work to put meat in a preheated dutch oven instead of foil?
Speaking of dutch ovens, anyone here do this type of cooking?

I do a lot of Dutch Oven Cooking.  Love the flavors and the food.  Fun also but the smoker is another animal all together and I keep the two separate LOL

 

[dog1234]

Hi Larry,

Yea i hear ya (intimidated)..........

So many different ways it seems.

I printed seleral post from this site, and trying to make heads r tails of them. Got fustraed and just put the meat on the heat.......... i got smoker purrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnnngggggggggggg at 215 to 235...... having trouble keeping somke coming out of the stack. I guess i will need to add hicory more often. R possibly use smaller pieces.

I am using round 2" to #' pieces that are 10" long. Got a sack from Academy......... What ya think?

 

[fishnhnter]

All,
As a ROUGH guess, how long would you think a 10# brisket needs to smoke at 225F before it reaches 190F?

 

[bomber]

I have an electric smoker so the smoke and heat come from the bottom.  Do I need to flip the meat?

 

[bruno994]

I have an electric smoker so the smoke and heat come from the bottom.  Do I need to flip the meat?

First of all, welcome to the forum.  You have found the place to be when it comes to smoking meat and at times, cooking in general.  SEcond, make sure and head over to Roll Call to introduce yourself.  To answer your question, you do not have to.  Cooking briskets is a person to person preference.   It also depends on what type of smoker you run.  Above you'll see oldschool cook his briskys fat side up, I do them fat side down.  I have cooked them both ways, but have settled in on fat side down as giving me the best results.  I run a stick / charcoal burner pit, while you are using electricity.  I think you will be fine either way, but maybe a few other electric smokers on here can give you their .02 cents.  Once again welcome and enjoy!

 

[bomber]

Hi Bruno994.  Thanks for the response!  I've got the 15lb hunk of heaven in the smoker now after 24 hours of private time with my rub...  I've got it in the smoker with the fat side up, at 225* and with excellent smoke (hickory and pecan wood).  At 1.5hrs per pound I'm scheduled to be done by 10am tomorrow morning but I've also got the thermo in to make sure.  The party's at 1 so we're on track thanks to the good advice from this thread.  Thank you all!

Per your advice, I'll leave it fat side up for the entire time.  Thanks again.

I'll also complete my profile ASAP.  Thanks again!

 

[pat king]

The timing of a piece of meat is"ONLY" a guesstimate at best, it should get you in the ball park,however we cook by temp.inside the meat,you may have your IMT to within 20° of the done temp,then you have to contend with the 'STALL", this will sometimes cause the temp. to actually back-up for a while as the collegen and connective tissues soften and release the muscle fibers,this could be from 30min. to 6hrs. ,depending on the meat, wild game is leaner and the temp. is watched closely, no fat to breakdown.

When the stall is reached, leave the fire alone,don't stoke it up, just keep the temp. regulated at around 225°. A mistake by many "Newbies" is to freak - out , smoking is a time consuming way of cooking;  it's not an instant gratification process.

Whether it is Spring ,Summer,Fall or Winter,you can cook, just plan a way "Yankee Ingenuity", to come-up with a way to Smoke. Here is another place a BBQ-LOG would be helpful,recording how you cooked it , how much fuel, steady temps.? , etc.it's how a lot of the oldtimers learned, that and seeing it as a youngster.

Choose wisely your type of Smoker and build on that...and again, my best advice is to be "PATIENT", and I mean 'the patience of Job', that is what we call the love in our "Q".

 Have fun and...

 

[jthneo]

I recently smoked my 1st brisket which was great but have picked up a lot of great tips from you guys to make my next one fantastic, which is why I'm here. Thanks guys...

 

[tgil]

I am the kind of person that doesnt have a bunch of time to tend the fire all night long, believe me I tried it and it was fun and all, but with as much time I put in at work, sleep becomes more important!

anyways... I have been having real good luck with my brisket with the following method.

1. come home from work and fire up the smoker, go inside and rub the brisket

2. place brisket on smoker after about an hour, when the first few logs are burnt down with good coals.

3. smoke that brisket till bedtime without opening smoker at all, just adding logs to maintain temps.

4. around bedtime, remove brisket from smoker, place in foil pan, cover it with foil, and put it in the oven, with meat temp probe of course. set the oven temp to 170 and let it go all night.

5. the next morning check it and make any adjustments in temp, if I want to slice it Ill set it to 180 but if i want to pull it, then I set the oven to 200

6. come home from work and it should be done, pull it from the oven and wrap in towels for an hour or two, then slice/pull when ready.

I also use the juice from the pans to whip up my own finishing sauce.

I have done as many as four large 10-12 #'ers at once and they all came out awesome!

so altogether the brisket is being cooked for at least 24 hours, and every one I have done has come out consistent, basically smoke as long as possible, then finish in the oven, good luck!

This sounds like a plan I can follow! I don't eat a lot of beef, mostly wild game, but my sis did a brisket a several months back that got me wanting to try one. I bought two packers, 9-10lbs ea. I cooked the first one up using her instruction, cooking on time, not IT. It turned out tough. She finally got around to cooking another and she too had te same results. After eating what they wanted that meal, she put it back in the oven for several more hours, giving her a total of 20 hours. She said that got it nice and tender.
I devised a plan to smoke one partially and finish in the oven. I got the smoke going and followed a modified "okjsmoker" routine. I smoked about six hours and tried to keep the temp around 250. The only time I opened the lid on the meat was when my temps flared up to the 300-350 range. Where I went wrong was setting the oven to 200 plus when I went to bed. My brisket hit 190 IT just before 1 A.M. This left me scrambling for advice on this forum on how to save my cook for 12 more hours until serving time!
I ended up reducing the heat and let it go to 200 IT which bought me some much needed time for sleep. When it hit 200 I pulled and put it in a cooler, with the probe still monitoring it. It got to 150 right at slicing time.
I got rave reviews, even though it was too tender to slice well. It would've been much more suitable for pulled, but overall I was able to salvage it and end up with tasty goodness!

 

[tjthedj]

Hey Dutch how long can I marinade a brisket can you do this to long.also is it better to cook it in a pan or on the grate.Thanks new to the game but love it.

 

[bruno994]

Tjthedj, brisket is such a large piece of meat, I'm not sure you can marinate it too long.  The flip side to marinading a brisket is that it is only going to penetrate so far unless you are planning on vacuum sealing your brisket with the marinade, this might drive the seasonings deeper into the meat, I have never done this, so I can only guess that it would assist in the penetration.  For good penetration into a thick cut, most of us inject.  I have been using a couple of commercial injections, but I have also just used homemade ones with a combo of broth, worcestshire and some seasonings cooked down.  I have found better results with the commercial injections, they allow me to cook a 12 to 15 pounder in about 6 hours, cooking hot and fast at 300+ degrees, and still be juicy and delish.   

 

[mr brisket]

Bruno
You talked about injecting an cooking faster and hotter will you please explain how that all comes together. Is it the injecting alone that allows you to do that and what happens to allow it. I read this in Myron Nixon's book but did not understand.

 

[bruno994]

There are a lot of comp cooks that cook hot and fast now, mainly for sleep reasons, but the results are as good as slow and low any day.  I have been using Butchers BBQ Brisket blend, there is also Kozmos injections, another popular one on the comp circuits.  Injections of phosphates (which is the base for these injections, will assist in keeping the meat moist through the cook, especially cooking hot and fast.   

 

[redraidersmoke]

Can anyone tell me the moisture difference they have experienced between foiling and no foil/mop? I've done a few briskets so far and I always foil around 160* with great results. I'm trying to get the most bark and the most moisture possible (the Holy Grail of brisket). I know the mop will soften the bark but I'm hoping that by not foiling it, I will get a better bark than I have. I plan on doing one this weekend on my kettle and starting to mop after about 4-5 hours. Does the mop even really add moisture or does it only flavor the exterior? Is injecting the best way to keep a brisket moist if I do not want to foil?

-Robert

 

[bruno994]

In my opinion, mopping will only add to the flavor your looking to create on the exterior and not add any moisture to the meat.  Plus, everytime you open to mop, your losing heat and adding time to the cook.  If your lookin', you ain't cookin'!  Injecting with a commercial injection is a sure fire way to add and keep more moisture in the meat.  I have been experimenting with both Butchers BBQ Brisket Injection and Kosmos Brisket injection.  The main reason I have been using them is due to the fact I have been cooking my briskets hot and fast lately (pit temp around 300, finishing 12# briskets in about 6 hours).  These injections have phosphates in them to keep and maintain the moisture in the meat.  Of course if you buy a better cut of meat, choice or waygu, the marbling itself will keep the meat moist, but I typically only cook USDA select with the occasional USDA angus choice thrown in.  I did try one this weekend (12# select grade) with no injection and had it turn out pretty good as well, cooking just below 300 and finishing in a little more than 6 hours.  I foil at or around 165 or so myself, then once it's passed the tenderness test, I'll open the foil up and leave it on the pit for another 30 minutes uncovered, to reset the bark, then it's off to the cooler for a little rest.  For the most part, I don't get a real good bark, due to 2 reasons, I use a RF pit so it's a pretty moist environment in the smoker with all the juices and stuff hitting the plate and creating steam, secondly I also don't have much sugar in my rub, which will carmelize and really create that nice, black bark. 

 

[ncsmokeu]

Like this sticky...what I've done for years!  170 foiled until 190-195 then wrap in towels and in the cooler for an hour.  Great every time!