first brisket and I need help

[Dave/G]

Originally posted by Craig Lax:
you guys are great.

they're pretty good, aren't they?

 

[Benny L.]

Craig:

One last tip, but it seems like you've got it down already... do not get discouraged! It can be a little bit of work getting used to the art and science of the WSM, but with just a little more practice and fine tuning I've found it's a pretty easy-going tool/cooker/toy. I've only been smoking about a year, and I turn out more consistent results than I do with grilling.

One piece of meat you might like to practice on is a pork butt / pork shoulder / pork picnic (i.e. Pulled Pork). There is a basic recipe in the main cooking topics section. Pork butt is a pretty forgiving piece of meat, in that it can put up with moderate temperature variations or a little over-cooking and still turn out just fine. It's also one of the cheapest barbeque meats, around here at least (butts around $1.25/lb, and picnics on sale for as little as $0.69/lb... but I'm getting off topic.)

Keep up the good attitude and keep practicing, and you'll have your "breakthrough" cook soon!

 

[Craig Lax]

Again, thanks for all the advice.

The pan did have water in it.

The one nice thing about this whole process is I get to eat. May not be the best tasting, moistest I've ever had, but it's still good and like many of you have said, you just gotta keep trying.

I'm trying it again on Sun. Father's day, and think I'll do ribs and Brisket. I feel more confident about the process.

Who knows, maybe I'll be giving advice in no time flat.

Thanks again.

Craig

 

[Dan H.]

hmm... I mean nothing to noone by this but I remember first signing on for a few smokin questions and you all were helpfull, but sometimes I think certain new member opinions make a lot more since then "guru" opinions.... I'll never cook a briskit on high and I don't see a lot of pros winnin trophies doin it either in defense of us humans (and new members), low and slow baby! (except ribs

).... I'm with you!

but again just thought I'de throw that in, I have had great help on here, but i'de never rough anyone up to bad, i'de never sign on again if I felt someone was makin fun of my ways of charcoal burnin (even though I burn lump) and I know what he meant by the samonella comment, and I don't think he meant that you could catch it from low and slow, I would assume it "feels" more safe to us humans w/ the high, fast, heat. I don't think the moderator guy of the site would want people sayin "bye" cause of thinkin were freaks.

thats just me though, I was a new member once too. have a good one. -Dan

 

[Bryan S]

Originally posted by Dan H.:
hmm... I mean nothing to noone by this but I remember first signing on for a few smokin questions and you all were helpfull, but sometimes I think certain new member opinions make a lot more since then "guru" opinions.... I'll never cook a briskit on high and I don't see a lot of pros winnin trophies doin it either in defense of us humans (and new members), low and slow baby! (except ribs

).... I'm with you!

but again just thought I'de throw that in, I have had great help on here, but i'de never rough anyone up to bad, i'de never sign on again if I felt someone was makin fun of my ways of charcoal burnin (even though I burn lump) and I know what he meant by the samonella comment, and I don't think he meant that you could catch it from low and slow, I would assume it "feels" more safe to us humans w/ the high, fast, heat. I don't think the moderator guy of the site would want people sayin "bye" cause of thinkin were freaks.

thats just me though, I was a new member once too. have a good one. -Dan

Dan, Several comments were made that are not true. Just trying to seperate the facts from the fiction, that's all. No harm meant to those who posted. People read here for information, just trying to correct the miss information that was posted.

 

[Dan H.]

right on baby! I just remember one time I didn't know somethin obvious and remember thinkin i kinda felt stupid with whatever responses I got, lol. I didnt mean a thing, bud. just remembered myself, you know

 

[K Kruger]

I could not care less about 'trophies' (but I can assure you there are more than a few comp cooks that cook briskets at high temps--as do several of the most famous Texas joints) but Bryan's comment was merely pointing out that it is an opinion (and long-held myth) that brisket 'needs' low/slow cooking. It doesn't. It might be one's opinion that low is better than high, or the reverse, but one should state it as such, not as if it is fact. This is especially im portant, imo, for the newbies reading the board because not only do myths not need to be spread as fact, but newbies (and others) are better off with more knowledge, not less, and the fact that you can turn out terrific brisket at high heat constitutes, to me, more knowledge.

As for my Salmonella comment, well, I take issue with erroneous food safety info. You may assume you know what the poster meant but I don't. I take it at face value but do assume that others might take it that way as well. I sought only to correct a factual error. We are entitled to our own opinions (and should point them out)--but not our own facts.

 

[r benash]

Originally posted by Bryan S:
<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-title">quote:</div><div class="ip-ubbcode-quote-content">lump charcoal is great for cooking chicken since you sorta need a higher temperature to fully cook to avoid salmonella. but for brisket regular kingsford is better.

the difference is the surface area of the lump is variable from piece to piece to burn rates will be different as the fire moves throught the coals and it is much harder to stabilize and keep stabile. with charcoal like kingsford the burn rate is the same begining to end.

That is so not true. I use lump 90-95% of the time on my cooks. I'll only use briqs when doing bacon or a cold smoke, or if I run out of lump, score a great deal on Royal Oak briqs, or Rancher briqs. And I never use Kingsford, can't stand the smell of it

Yes but... that's why there's 100's of posts on TVWBB telling people tp pack the ring when using lump. Put the big pieces on the bottom or top depending how they come out of the bag. Fill 1/3rd up of lump and rock the charcoal bowl back and forth. Do another 1/3rd rock, repeat. Takes less than a minute to do. This will eliminate the big air gaps and make that lump burn just as stable as briqs. </div></BLOCKQUOTE>

Use lump 99% of the time. On the grill in the WSM, in the horizontal. It's an all around fuel. I don't do any cold smokes yet though.

For comparison. I am just outside of Philly and did a rib cook on Sunday which was 95 to 100 deg. Cooked 4 racks of spares. Maintained 250 to 265 for 4 hours. Mostly ran at 250. Continued to burn after the cook well into the evening for another 6 hours or so at a steady 250.

I have also cooked quite a few butts on it and am able to keep the lump burning at 250 for 14 hours. A spike her or there of 25 deg, but then again I typically don't pack the lump - I usually just dump it in and shake the ring a bit. Sometime I'll hollow out the middle to dump the lit or just dump the lit on top.

Lump works fine for me on long cooks.

Don't like the smell of non hardwood briquettes myself. To each his own. Just wanted to mention that lump in my view works just fine for long cooks. I do agree that it burns hotter though than briquettes.

My first couple cooks on the WSM, it was spikey and hot and ran up to 350 degrees. After the 2nd or 3rd cook it settled out. I do think I am leaky around the base (a little out of round). Once I fix that I'm pretty sure I should be able to keep it down to 200 or 225 if I want. Right now it won't extinguish with all vents closed. I am using Humphrey's lump.

 

[Vic C]

Hi Craig, It sounds like you got allot of good advice. The next time you try a brisket try wrapping it up when it reaches a meat temp of 160. IMO this helps it from drying out. The flat at least, I don't know if you could dry out the point it has so much fat in it (my favorite part). Also try cooking it fat side up and get a 14 inch flower pot plate and use that instead of water. I hope your next cook goes well.

 

[Rich Langer]

I think we missed something.

Craig the OP said that the temp went up very quickly. He said a lot of other stuff and help was offered for the other stuff, but none of us got info about how much lump was in the chimney.

I use brix and I used to have a heck of a time controlling MM starts - because I had too much in the chimney. I suspect that Craig also has too much in there. I usually use about 10 - 12 brix but he uses lump and I don't know how to translate, but I'm sure a lump user can help.

 

[Bryan S]

Rich, That was covered on page one. Craig said he used a full chimney of lit Lump.

Thank you all for the advice.

full ring
1/4 pack chimney
play for about an hour till stabablized
monitor the cook
better lump than cowboy

 

[Rich Langer]

Thanks Byran, I missed that.

HOWEVER, a quarter chimney of brix is way too much - is a "1/4 pack chimney" of lump right? - sounds like a lot to me.

 

[Bryan S]

is a "1/4 pack chimney" of lump right? - sounds like a lot to me.

It's not too much depending on the size of the lump. He was using cowboy lump and that's lumber scraps so they are on the med to large size. When I use lit (usually just use the torch and light 3 spots in the lump) for the MM I usually use briqs, 6-10 depending on how much cold mass I'm starting out with.

 

[Bryan S]

Originally posted by Vic C:
Also try cooking it fat side up

Vic, The trend for cooking fat side up has been moving more towards fat side down the past few years. The theroy is with the fat cap facing down towards the hot coals and heat coming up from below helps protects the brisket from drying out. For years the thought was if you cook it fat side up, the fat would "run through the meat and keep it moist" that's just not possible. When the meat cooks it's pushing out the juices and fat so there's no way that the fat is going to go into the meat and baste it. I look at it like this. When I cook a steak I put on a pat of butter while it's resting. The butter melts and runs on to the plate, it doesn't go into the meat. Try a brisket fat side down sometime, and see what you think.

 

[Craig Lax]

Thank you all again. I went to the local shop right and they had Royal Oak. So I bought that. I also bought a full brisket and 4 racks of spare ribs.

I'm going for it this sunday. I'll post pics if it works out well.

what type of smoke wood would you recommend? Hickory? Mesquite? and how much for this much meat?

I'm going to put the brisket on the bottom rack and the ribs on top. The ribs will be circular with a large skewer through them.

I will foil both the ribs and brisket at the end.

I'm starting around 5am and hopefully food will be ready by noon.

the brisket is 6lbs (pre trimmed) should I start that the night before? around midnight? for 12 hrs? Thanks again.

-Craig

 

[LarryR]

Hickory? Mesquite?

I Personally do not like Mesquite, for me it seems to have a bit of a "bite" to it. I'd go Hickory. In terms of how much . . . I'd go 6 fist size pieces, I like my briskets smokey and they seem to be able to handle a lot of smoke. However, you're doing ribs too right? You might want to reserve 1/2 the wood for when you put your ribs on. I've done this before and it's worked pretty well. In fact here's what I would do; use 4 fist size chunks when you start your brisket, then when you add your ribs go 2 to 3 chunks. I've been using less wood on my rib smokes recently and focusing more on rubs.

Lastly, for me fat size down works best.

 

[Bryan S]

the brisket is 6lbs (pre trimmed) should I start that the night before? around midnight? for 12 hrs?

Craig, When I cook flats I figure on 1 - 1.5 hrs per lb. Most of the time they cook right at 1hr 15 min per lb. Only ever had one cook at 1 hr per lb. So figure somewhere between 6 - 9 hrs for your flat at 235-250 grate temp. Good luck.

 

[K Kruger]

I Personally do not like Mesquite, for me it seems to have a bit of a "bite" to it. I'd go Hickory. In terms of how much . . . I'd go 6 fist size pieces, I like my briskets smokey and they seem to be able to handle a lot of smoke. However, you're doing ribs too right? You might want to reserve 1/2 the wood for when you put your ribs on.

Agreed. Never been a fan of mesquite for long cooks. Like it for grilling though. I'd also use less wood upfront, adding more when the ribs go in.

 

[Craig Lax]

I'm set!!!!

Thank you to you all for the advice. Have a happy father's day to all and to all good eats (I know it's probably copyrighted by food network, but I'm acknowledging that)

-Craig

 

[Vic C]

Hi Bryan, I'll have to try fat side down on my next cook. I've only been smoking for 2 years and when I first tried it fat side down it didn't turn out that well. It was most likely because of something else that I did.