Brisket losing moisture during cool down period


 
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Dave Chiang

New member
Hey, new to the forum and sorry if this is yet another tiresome dry brisket thread.

I've mainly cooked briskets previously in my 22" kettle and now I'm doing them on my 26". I've always had a problem with dry brisket flats. I've tried shorter cooks and longer cooks but I've always had a problem with the flat. Best solution for a "somewhat" moist flat for me has been to find briskets with the thickest flats I can. I wasn't planning to buy a brisket at the time, but I stumbled on a 16.5 lb choice brisket that seemed relatively floppy and had one of the thickest flats I'd ever come across, so I snapped it up.

Just cooked it yesterday on my 26" with slow/sear XL.

-I used the water trough and put in about 3 big chunks of hickory on top of the coals.
-I smoked it for ~ 6.5 hours at around 250 deg and it appeared to stall at 156 deg. I developed a pretty good bark, though there were a couple of flat areas that "pooled" too much moisture.
-At the end of the smoke, I pulled it off the kettle and wrapped it in pink butcher paper.
-I put it into my oven and cooked for another 3 hours at 280 deg. I pulled the brisket out when it reached 202 deg.

At the end of the cook, I did the probe test and it was reasonably buttery. I felt the flat side and it felt reasonably "jiggly". Not the optimum amount of "jiggle" you like seeing, but it was reasonable enough and actually very good relative to my past results.

I kept it wrapped in the butcher paper. I have a "2 in 1" oven, so I switched it out from the oven that had been at 280 deg and put it into the oven that hadn't been turned on. I let it sit in the unheated oven for about 2 hours or so and checked on it from time to time. I noticed that as time went on, the brisket flat got firmer and less jiggly. and on the baking sheet that the brisket sat in, more and more juices were accumulating.

At the end of the 2 hours, the brisket was noticeably less moist and jiggly than when I had finished the cook. It seemed that the brisket continued to "sweat out" the moisture and it ended up in my baking sheet. I had a SUBSTANTIAL amount of juices accumulated in the baking sheet at the end of the cool.

So is there something I should know to do better during the cool down to keep the juices in the brisket itself? I'm just trying to get a moist brisket as everyone seems to get at the end of their youtube vids, LOL. Thanks all.
 
That moisture you speak of is really the denatured connective tissue. During the cooking process the connective tissue becomes gelatin. If allowed to cook beyond that stage, the gelatin "leaks" out leaving an overcooked brisket. The brisket will be dry and crumbly. The cool down to below cooking temperature should happen as rapidly as possible.
 
Thanks for the reply Bob. That makes perfect sense what you're saying about "leaking out" when you overcook. But isn't 6.5 hrs of smoke at 250-260 deg and then wrapping for 3 hrs in the oven at 280 deg for (for a 16.5 LBer before trimming) a fairly reasonable, or even shorter than average cook?

If you've got a good, quick routine for the cool down, let me know it. I just read stuff about how some people advocated for multiple hours of cooling and thought that not having a long enough down cool was my problem. I obviously wasn't the case for me this time.

What you say makes sense to me and would suggest that I did overcook, but I just never equated the times/temps I used as overcooking. And I didn't go above 202 deg on the thick part of the flat.
 
9.5 hours for a 16.5lb brisket is fairly quick. Although I typically cook a bit lower and finish on the grill.

I don’t see anything glaring that says it should be dry. I never cool brisket, I wrap at stall and pull and toss it in a cooler in my cold oven for at least two hours. And it’s never dry.

Only thing I may do different is spritz and when I wrap, pour some of my spritz in before going back on.
 
Harry Soo has suggested in the past, for those who wrap in foil, to open up the top of the foiled brisket in a sort of chimney appearance to cool the brisket to 170. Then rewrap and store in your Cambro / cooler in towels. He even had this procedure up on YouTube.
He used this procedure when I took his class 10 years ago.

Harry's video on cooldown

For those who use paper, I have no idea....
 
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It does sound like your brisket lingered at or even slightly above your 202*F finished temp and kept cooking.

What some of the Texas joints do that use butcher paper is take it out of the smoker when it reaches 205*F finished temp, keep it wrapped and place it on a baking sheet, and let it cool at room temp until the internal temp comes down to 160*F. Then move it into a hot box and hold at 145*F for several (or many) hours before slicing and serving.

In your situation, you can wrap the brisket, put it on a baking sheet, and stick it in your 280*F oven. When it hits 202*F, move the sheet pan to the stove top and let it cool to 160*F before holding it at 145*F.

Slice and serve at an internal temp of 145*F.

Good luck and don't get discouraged. There's a very narrow window between underdone, perfect, and overdone. The guys and gals who cook a ton of briskets get really good at it. The rest of us occasionally cook a really good one. I've never cooked a perfect one in 25 years, but all have been edible. And good thing I like barbecue sauce!

By the way, one more thing. Not sure which videos you're watching, but are they using USDA Prime briskets? Yours was Choice; the consensus these days is you'll get better results using Prime, they've got more fat and tend to be more forgiving. The pros out there can make great brisket with Choice or even Select, but that window of perfection becomes even more narrow as the grade goes down...technique and experience become super important.
 
Thanks Chris and others for the advice. Yeah, I think next time I'll try cooling it at room temp.

I've bought prime brisket before at Costco. I don't think I've gotten noticeable differences in end results from the times I bought choice, though. None that I can remember. I'll try a prime next time, as it's the same price as the choice at my local Smart & Final (it's a cross between a regular grocer and warehouse we have out West).

Remember, my problem right now doesn't appear to be rendering the fat/collagen. It's losing it during the end of the cook or cool down. I'll keep trying and the stuff I make is more than edible, so I'm not too discouraged. In fact, saving all the drippings and pouring it back on the sliced meat while it's still warm does work decently, though obviously not the same as just keeping it in there to begin with.
 
I have fallen victim to those scenarios as well before and appreciate the replies you just got.
Thanks Bob and Chris.

There is one thing I am going to experiment with on my next brisket cook and that is a bit of beef tallow in my butcher paper.
I seen some interesting YouTube vids on that.
 
Dave....
It's not unusual for competition pitmasters to defat and strain those drippings for use with injections.
It's been referred to as Liquid Gold at times.... ;)
 
This was always my biggest problem until I watched a few Mad Scientist BBQ videos. As Chris and others have stated, you must stop the cooking process once it's completely tender. Once the brisket has reached the desired tenderness (in the pink butcher paper with smoked beef tallow), I take it off the pit, bring it into the kitchen and leave it sit open on the counter until it hits 155-160°F in the thickest part of the flat; usually about 30-45 minutes.
I take it back outside and do the whole wrapping procedure all over again, with more beef tallow, and then it goes in for a nice long nap. A warming oven set to no higher than 160°F will do the trick, with the wrapped brisket on a cookie sheet to prevent liquid spills, and I use a remote thermometer to ensure the meat never falls below 145°, for food safety reasons. I'll hold it for at least 3-4 hours, but longer is better. It's still safe and will be nice and hot at 145-150 degrees.

Slice to order only, don't slice the whole thing up or it'll dry out within 5 minutes. In my big parties I let folks queue up for cut-to-order brisket and it's gone within 10 minutes.
 
Getting ready to do another one soon but my oven only goes as low as 170,should I just let it rest open to160 internal and them put in a cooler wrapped in towels to accomplish basically the same thing.
 
LouieD said:
Getting ready to do another one soon but my oven only goes as low as 170,should I just let it rest open to160 internal and them put in a cooler wrapped in towels to accomplish basically the same thing.
Click to expand...
That'll work (preheat the cooler with hot water first) and put in enough towels to fully insulate it. I use 4 towels; two on top, two on the bottom). Just monitor the temp remotely. You don't want the IT to fall below 140 (say 145 to be safe).
Also, I'll bet your stove has a warming drawer; electric stoves it's usually the drawer under the oven. Set your oven to 170 and put it in there. Voila. 150ish.
 
I find that keeping the oven door slightly open with a spoon works great on low temp requirements like when I cook jerky.
 
David,
I think you did everything reasonably well. I only picked up a few issues. If I were you, I'd pick the brisket, not because the brisket was floppy and thick (which are okay metrics) but first and foremost, because it is well marbled. In my brain, I go through a long list of preferences when standing in front of a number of brisket choices at the store.

1. marbling (related to prime, choice, select but not always)
2. weight
3. thickness
4. lack of liquid in cryovac
5. color
6. shape (narrow briskets have shorter slices).

The floppiness can be a function of the thickness of the fat cap, assuming this is a commercially raised cow. And the grain finished cows will have a harder white fat cap. It is different on the grass fed ones. The fat on grass fed cows is softer and more yellow in tone. So floppiness may not be a very good metric on moisture but rather an indication of the thickness of the fat cap, which I'm uncertain if that matters.
The other thing you can do to help is to inject. I'm not sure I can get a choice commercial brisket to have the right texture without injecting. Maybe I could it on a prime but it is still hard. Keep up the great work.
Donna
 
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