Let’s Talk BBQ- Brisket
April 22nd, 2008
Spring has started to sprung here in The Rose City, and with all this BBQ I have been sampling lately, I have been dying to make some of my own. I broke in my cooker a few weeks back on a rosemary/lemon chicken, but I wanted to do something more advanced for the last day of my vacation. I headed over to the cash and carry and picked up a 11 pound brisket for around $20.00.
Now, lets talk a bit about brisket. Brisket comes from the belly of the steer and is in many ways like bacon. In fact, you can find Beef Bacon in many of your high end stores and better meat markets. It is cured and smoked in the same manner as pork bacon. Many of you may be familiar with brisket in another common form. Corned Beef is simply brisket that has been brined in a salt solution and spices. Nitrates are often added to give it that distinctive pink color.
When cooking brisket it is important to to remember that it is made up of long muscle fibers. Long fiber cuts, such as brisket and chuck have to be cooked low and slow, preferably braised in some type of liquid. The low temperature of smoking and the long cooking time make this cut an excellent choice for the smoker. The other contributing factor is the high fat content.
When you buy a brisket, expect about 1/3 to 1/2 to be fat. It is the high fat content that gives the meat the moisture it will need to survive a 12 hour plus smoke. Now, next time you are in a grocery store, take a look at their fine selection of closely trimmed brisket. Now, if you want to simmer it for 45 minutes per pound in a savory liquid, you are going to have a melt in your mouth meat experience. Throw one of these into your smoker, and your going to be dining on shoe leather. Go to Costco or your local restaurant supply to get a whole brisket untrimmed. You will thank me for it. You can figure on losing about half your weight when you trim off the fat after it is cooked. Yes, I know, life isn’t fair.
For my smoke today, I purchased a whole brisket and cut it in half. Last night I seasoned one half with a dry rub mixture that Brandon of bbqPDX gave me. The other I coated with peppercorns, that I cracked in my coffee grinder, and garlic powder. I covered both with plastic and let them sit in the fridge overnight.
4 AM comes awful early. If you have made the investment in an electric smoker with automatic pellet feed, you are one up on me for brisket. You can throw it on and start it at midnight and it will feed itself until noon. Same for a real wood smoker if you know what you are doing. With a water smoker, you have to change out the chips about every ninety minutes or so, so if you want to smoke a brisket, your looking at starting by 5am to have it ready by 5pm.
I had loaded my chip box and water bowl the night before so when I woke up all I had to do is light it off and wait for it to get to temperature. By 4:45, I was all systems go with the meat in the box. It wasn’t long before I realized that something was wrong. I could not get the temp down into the 200-220 degree range that I like for brisket. I grabbed my remote probe thermometer and dangled the probe through the top vent of my cooker. 210 degrees, perfect. Then it dawned on me, the thermometer on the front of my cooker must have gone tits up over the winter, because it was registering 265. I rigged my probe so that is was hanging as close to the center of the box as I could, and used it for the rest of the day.
I used a mixture of Mesquite and Hickory. I tend to stick with chunks as opposed to shreds for long smokes. I soak them for twenty minutes in tap water, and then drain. It gets them just moist enough to give a really great smoke. The other thing I discovered today is an accessory that I will no longer be able to live without, but I am hesitant to share it with you, as I feel pretty stupid for not figuring it out sooner. It is that simple.
Work gloves. Plain old, heavy duty, $8.00 a pair, thick canvas work gloves. They are perfect for dumping my cast iron chip box. Took me two years to figure out there had to be a better way to go then folded up dishtowels. Geez, what a putz.
When doing brisket, make sure you have everything you need before hand, because you are not going anywhere for ten to twelve hours once the meat hits the cooker depending on the thickness of the piece you are cooking.
Honestly, I don’t even bother checking the thermometer until I have eight hours in. You are going to be looking for an internal temperature of around 160. It will finish cooking as it rests.
Here is another tip for those of you using water smokers. The moisture from the gas and water bowl makes it hard to get a real good crust (bark) on your brisket. You can help mother nature along by filling a spray bottle with apple cider and spritzing down your brisket every time you change out chips. The sugars in the cider will caramelize and add a nice black crust to your meat.
Once your meat has rested for 10 to twenty minutes, slice against the grain and enjoy. Serve on a good crusty roll with your favorite sauce for a brisket sandwich or plated with sauce on the side.
Well, I hope this will be some help to those of you trying out brisket for the first time. Its a bit more work then most, but the results are well worth it.