Smoking my 2nd Brisket 10 pounder w/ Qview

[jeremymillrood]

Father-in-law requested a brisket for his birthday and I haven't done one yet in my new smoker so I was pretty happy about the request.

Picked up a 10 lb packer from the butcher yesterday, $4.99/lb, trimmed up some of the fat when I got it home, coated it with yellow mustard did my usual rub, saran wrapped and threw in the fridge.

Got up at quarter 'til 6 and got the fire going, I used 4 decent size pieces  of well seasoned oak that I started with a chimney full of lit lump charcoal..once that was going I dropped on my 2 chunks of hickory and 2 chunks of apple wood (dry).  When the temp in the smoke chamber had steadied at 250 I got the brisket on that was about 6:30 am, inside temp was 46 degrees

Couple of observations, I'm using the Maverick remote thermometer that reads the meat and smoke chamber temps.  Found that the thermometer on the smoker reads about 50 degrees less than the Maverick.

By 7:30 the meat temp hit 62 degrees smoker was steady at 250

8:35 meat hit 98 degrees

9:45 meat hit 128, I took a peek inside the fire box and my fuel was almost completely gone, added some more lump and a couple of pieces of oak.

Pics to follow.

 

[eman]

OMG they bend you over on brisket prices down there huh?

 Hope it all goes well .

 There's not much better than a great smoked brisket.

 

[jeremymillrood]

Getting everything ready..



Fire going..



Brisket on..



Finally light out, smoker running about 230 degrees, this Redi Check thermometer is great.



Cant' even see the smoke..



About 3 and a half hrs in..

 

[jeremymillrood]

Yeah $4.99 is pretty stiff, but these guys have the best meat so I don't mind paying it.
 

OMG they bend you over on brisket prices down there huh?

 Hope it all goes well .

 There's not much better than a great smoked brisket.

 

[jeremymillrood]

11:51, 159 degrees..I think it's stalled..

 

[Bearcarver]

Looking Great Jeremy!

 

[coronaca92879]

Yea quality does affect price.

 

[eman]

Dont know if they have ag or iga grocers in Fla. but if they do check them out for meats.

 This week  my local iga has choice angus packers @$1.99 lb.

 

[jeremymillrood]

Guess a late update is better than no update at all.  By about 1:00 the meat hit 165.  I pulled it out double foiled, and put it in a little bath of beef broth and onion soup mix. I added some more wood to the fire box and went to cut the grass knowing I was getting short on time..by about 2:30 or so the meat was at 174, but then it started raining..It never fails when I'm either smoking or grilling it has to rain. 

Anyway, I had no choice but to pull it and finish it in the oven.  I figured 8 hours of smoking was a pretty decent amount so the meat should be fine. In to a 300 degree oven it went and it finished up in about an hour or so.  Got it out of the oven and put it in to the cooler wrapped in towel until dinner time..

No pics of the finished product, but I can tell you the meat came out great.  I tried a different technique this time by putting the fat side on the bottom as is recommended by Minion in the Weber grilling book and the meat came out extremely moist and tender.  I thought it was perfectly done.

Now the critique..I was having trouble controlling my smoke, when I added more fuel to the fire I got the big billowy smoke this would continue for 45 minutes to an hour or more until the wood burned down quite a bit..Tried leaving the fire box open for a while after adding the wood to let it burn down but that really didn't help.  My top vent was entirely open, so I'm not sure where I went wrong. 

The meat..while I feel it came out really good, this brisket had a lot, and I mean a lot of fat in it..Considering how much I paid, I was pretty disappointed that cap had so much fat you really couldn't eat it.  Has anyone ever had this problem, and what should I look for in the future when I buy my next brisket.

For my next attempt I think I'm going to do two briskets, I'll foil one and do the other one unfoiled in the smoker the entire time to do a side by side..That's all for now.