Ref; And Pulled the Trigger..First Brisket

[TomKnollRFV]

Well checked her about 5-10 mins ago...162f. I think I can take an hour or two nap safetly lol.

 

[TomKnollRFV]

24 hours seems pretty extreme at anything in the 240 range. Didn't you say this was about 12 pounds? You've got me worried about the 4th.

George

Now to truly worry Riverside..took a nap, got up just a bit ago. Go out and check the Temp...either my second thermal probe is shot, which I hope not..or this is one long smoke.

174f Internal folk!

PS: She's getting soft now, any one ever had a Brisket end up feeling super soft way before 205f? I thought until that temp, Brisket was -basically- a giant slab that was impossible to deal with. I'm not pulling her until she reaches 200f, just wondering.

 

[TomKnollRFV]

178f ish.

The thin part is feeling tougher then the thick part now. Should I just pull this sucker? I literally just lit -another- full 5x8 tray in preparation for never sleeping again LOL

Update:

Alright, I moved the thermal probes around and..now the temperature is reading lower. Not sure what to make of that. I light the third tray of pellets now and could use advice here.

An instant read thermometer I put into the thickest part reads 164f. I now have my smoker at 250f. I'm not sure what to make of this. I've never had temperatures start doing down.

 

[TomKnollRFV]

Update; Tom is not a smart man.

It just -now- occured to me, to look at the drip pan I had under the Brisket. PRETTY full. I filled an entire pickle jar with the juice/water. Still odd it got up to 178f then started back down, but temps are working right again now that I removed that.

32 Ounce jar full of Au Jus drippings. I did the upside down in the fridge thing I read about here.

Now I just need to hope the brisket is done some time before I pass out lol.

 

[tallbm]

I'm not sure what is going on but too much liquid in your MES isn't going to help things. I would imagine you have a continuous sweat effect going on.

Also don't trust the MES probes AT ALL! This is why we often recommend at least a wireless dual probe thermometer like the TP20. You can use other thermometers with more probes but with at least 2 probes you can use one probe to measure the temp of the smoker at meat level and the other to measure the IT of the meat.

As for the end of the brisket being tough that will happen with the thin end, it just burns up. This is why I always recommend that people trim off the thin end of the flat in a way that leaves the rest of the flat almost the same uniform thickness all over. This way things cook evenly and you don't lose that meat. You can use that trimmed off meat else where or throw it in later to make burnt ends. See my trimming example here:

BrisketFlatTrimAway

• tallbm
• Oct 7, 2017

Finally, you will want to put the meat probe in the center of the Flat not the point. I personally run 3 probes in my briskets because I can usually get 1 out of 3 into proper placement. It is also crazy to see how the 3 probes change lead with the temp and how it fluctuates, etc. It seems like a brisket is possessed with those IT's so I use 3 of them lol.

Basically, welcome to the world of the brisket! Don't trust your MES temps, use a good thermometer to measure the smoker and IT temps of the meat, and don't be afraid to run a brisket at higher temps as it can handle it and that saves you hours upon hours of time :)

 

[TomKnollRFV]

Oh no, my MES internal built in probe hting I never trust. I run a dual wireless probe <Which one is now broken.>.

Normally with big hunks of meat, I shove the two wireless ones in at random spots and the MES one in some where just because I have it.

Really annoyed one of my remote probes took a shit on me though.

 

[tallbm]

Oh no, my MES internal built in probe hting I never trust. I run a dual wireless probe <Which one is now broken.>.

Normally with big hunks of meat, I shove the two wireless ones in at random spots and the MES one in some where just because I have it.

Really annoyed one of my remote probes took a shit on me though.

Yep that sucks. I run a total of 6 probes. HeaterMeter smoker probe +3 meat probes and then TP20 - 2probes.
I use 3 for smoker temps and 3 for meat temps. The hot side of my smoker is the back left and the cooler side is front right. I probe meat in left/middle/right sections unless it's a big cut like a brisket where I then put the 3 meat probes in the flat so I get at least 1 in correctly lol.

 

[TomKnollRFV]

I just sort of stab things in across the entire bit and look at the temp range and figure the average is a safe bet. This sucker is about to come off..I mean. It's 12:22 AM. I am pretty sure, after the situation of the au jus pan causing temps to sit at the 180 mark for a while etc, it's done.

 

[tallbm]

I just sort of stab things in across the entire bit and look at the temp range and figure the average is a safe bet. This sucker is about to come off..I mean. It's 12:22 AM. I am pretty sure, after the situation of the au jus pan causing temps to sit at the 180 mark for a while etc, it's done.

If it's not probing tender when you pull it just finish it off in the oven if your thermometer has an alarm.
This will be less hassle. The Point is probably good to do but the flat may not be tender and I guess you could just wrap and foil and continue it separately tomorrow in the oven if you need to get it tender.

Brisket teaches us something almost every time. Looks like you have had one heck of a learning experience with it this time around :)

 

[TomKnollRFV]

Well, it went in like butter pretty much every where..and it was on there for ..some thing like 32 hours because of me being dumb and not taking out the full pan of au jus..

Right now it's just in the oven to cool down with out flies getting to it, then into the fridge till tommorrow...I wanted to wait an hour before cutting in but..well..me and my dad were looking mighty hungry at this brisket..

 

[banderson7474]

32 hours????!!!

 

[Bearcarver]

Well, it went in like butter pretty much every where..and it was on there for ..some thing like 32 hours because of me being dumb and not taking out the full pan of au jus..

Right now it's just in the oven to cool down with out flies getting to it, then into the fridge till tommorrow...I wanted to wait an hour before cutting in but..well..me and my dad were looking mighty hungry at this brisket..

If it went in like butter, you're good to go.

However I'd put all those Therms through some rigorous testing!!
Be interesting to know if your smoker was really at 240° through that long smoke.

Bear

 

[TomKnollRFV]

The heating element was trying to keep it up to 240f. But with the Au Jus pan full, the area right above the Au Jus was pretty much hovering around 190f.

Once I removed the Au Jus pan, things went along just fine. Also the bark darkened up and looked like the kind of bark I like. As if some thing got to close to the sun. <I like dark and thicker bark!>

So very likely had I not forgotten the Au Jus bit, this would have been far quicker. Got hard to see how full it was when it was dark and this cheapo aluminum pans .. well. I don't know, next time I'll put rocks in the corner or some thing to keep them from starting to warp and make it unlevel. Now to eat brisket today for dinner ;)