Todd, you'll be amazed once you do a cook with the fire method that Jim Minion accidently came up with. I very rarely cook on the WSM during the day except for fast cooks like chicken. Seems the WSM prefers the moonlight and coyote songs to harsh sunlight and traffic noises.
I start my setup with a full ring of charcoal and 15-20 fully lit pieces on top around 8 pm, with a few wood chunks or foil packets of wood pellets buried through the charcoal. Brisket goes on right after I assemble the cooker. I want my brisket as cold as possible when I put it on the cooker. For competitions the smoke ring is not taken into consideration, but the longer it takes meat to get to 140, the more smoke ring will form. It will continue to absorb smoke flavor after that, but the chemical process that forms the ring stops around 140.
I'm a purist - I still use a real water pan and am quite happy with that setup, though I do use the larger 2-gallon pan so I don't have to refill water as often. After meat's on and cooker is assembled, I let the temp as shown by a probe dangling through the top vents get to 200 or sometimes as high as 220, then shut the vents down to about 1/4 open. Temp'll climb on up to about 250-260 in the lid, which is where I want it to run. It's MUCH easier to slow the temp on the climb up than it is to bring it back down and stabilize it. I keep the receiver of a Nu-Temp in my bedroom window, and just roll over a few times during the night, glance at the temps, and roll back over and go back to sleep. Rarely do I have to mess with it during the night. Probably wouldn't at all, except the schnauzer usually wakes me up sometime during the night to go out so I'll refill the waterpan or something then just to make myself feel useful.
For brisket, I like to trim off the hard non-renderable fat, and tuck those big chunks underneath the ends of the brisket closest to the walls of the cooker. That keeps those ends from catching so much of the brunt of heat that will be coming up around the water pan. If you find that your brisket is too long to fit without bumping up against the walls of the cooker, just get your knife and slice a big hunk off the point end, rub it well, and set it on the grate to the side of your brisket. (Makes a great treat of burnt ends for breakfast!)
I started cooking WSM briskets fat side up, then switched to flipping twice during the cook, and now I just leave them fat side down for the whole cook. In the WSM the heat is coming from the bottom, and the fat cap helps protect the lean meat. Unless I'm doing a fast brisket cook, I don't usually foil my briskets at all until they're done - until I can poke a 2-tined meat fork into the side of the flat and pull it out with no resistance. If you try to pick up the brisket with the meat fork, it should tell you in no uncertain terms that it's going to fall apart if you try to lift it. If you can poke at the brisket with your finger and it'll do a visual "wabba-wabba" dance, then wonderful things are about to unfold.
If you are happy with the tenderness when you start to take it off the cooker, put it ON a double layer of HD foil, wrap the edges of the foil up somewhat around the meat, but let it cool for about 15 minutes or so before you completely seal it up. Wrapping it tight immediately upon removal from the cooking will allow cooking to continue. If you have it where you want it, you don't want it to cook any more. You just want it to rest.
Give that brisket another shot, Todd. I'm willing to bet that with the Minion modification to your firing approach, you will see all the difference in the world.
Keri C, Hot Wire BBQ (who can't write a short post to save her life...)
2 well-worn WSMs
1 Diamond Plate Products "Fat 50" (with chrome Peterbilt stacks - a girl's gotta have her bling)
1 ECB circa 1981 (retired)
1 Stumper Gravity Feed clone size XL (under construction)
