G
Guest
Guest
I *love* brisket.
the local smokey bones does good pork, the beans are above average, the brisket is awful.
the wsm was in the house, so I couldn't restrain myself. I used the recipe on the midnight cook page.
the thing was hard to keep below 250 degrees without closing all lower vents and waiting for it to drop before reopening. even after closing the temp. went up for a while. hoping this is the 'new wsms run hot syndrome'. but overnight I left only one vent slightly cracked and the maverick woke me up with the smoker at 225, so I think I just need more practice.
the harder part was getting it stable on any temp. the whole cook until the very end was "too hot - close vents - sinking temp - open vents - soaring temp - close vents...repeat". I guess I should specify that 'open' and 'close' usually meant one vent (the others stayed closed) and 'open' typically meant 'crack slightly'. the most it ever opened was nearly halfway when it sunk to 225 overnight. for a while I tried cracking all three slightly. same effect, skyrocketing temps. *really* easy to get to 260 - 265 deg.
just more practice, or should I be more concerned with the lack of a perfect fit on the center section to the lower bowl? not hugely out of round, but it will rock.
but--at least part of the brisket turned out great. best I've ever tasted. good rub, chris, thanks. this was a 5 pound flat (per the cryo packaging). the very ends were superb. but I have questions about the middle:
if you look at the finished product pic on the midnoght cook page, you see how you've got uniform meat, looks like 1.5 inches thick? I've got that, then on top of that over about 3/4 the length of the cut there's another layer, the same thickness, of *really* fatty meat. you can see the clear demarcation in cross-section: brisket, thin fat layer, fatty, spongy meat layer (gimme a day and I can get pics if it helps). is this top layer the fat cap I read about? I thought the fat cap was the thin (about 1/8") layer immediately on top of what I'm calling the brisket, or what you see in the midnight cook pic. my lower portion looks just like that. what's the stuff on top? on the outer ends of the cut, this layer isn't there and the slices look like the midnight cook pic, and what I identify as brisket, and they are _incredible_.
in the future, should I look for this layer before cooking (the cut looked like the web pics when raw, I thought, but this would be the first time I've dealt with raw beef other than hamburger or the occasional steak), or was this a strange cut, or should I be removing this top layer after cooking, or...?
all in all, I'm pleased, but if I can improve on this, man, I might be doing this every night.
thanks in advance.
scott
the local smokey bones does good pork, the beans are above average, the brisket is awful.
the wsm was in the house, so I couldn't restrain myself. I used the recipe on the midnight cook page.
the thing was hard to keep below 250 degrees without closing all lower vents and waiting for it to drop before reopening. even after closing the temp. went up for a while. hoping this is the 'new wsms run hot syndrome'. but overnight I left only one vent slightly cracked and the maverick woke me up with the smoker at 225, so I think I just need more practice.
the harder part was getting it stable on any temp. the whole cook until the very end was "too hot - close vents - sinking temp - open vents - soaring temp - close vents...repeat". I guess I should specify that 'open' and 'close' usually meant one vent (the others stayed closed) and 'open' typically meant 'crack slightly'. the most it ever opened was nearly halfway when it sunk to 225 overnight. for a while I tried cracking all three slightly. same effect, skyrocketing temps. *really* easy to get to 260 - 265 deg.
just more practice, or should I be more concerned with the lack of a perfect fit on the center section to the lower bowl? not hugely out of round, but it will rock.
but--at least part of the brisket turned out great. best I've ever tasted. good rub, chris, thanks. this was a 5 pound flat (per the cryo packaging). the very ends were superb. but I have questions about the middle:
if you look at the finished product pic on the midnoght cook page, you see how you've got uniform meat, looks like 1.5 inches thick? I've got that, then on top of that over about 3/4 the length of the cut there's another layer, the same thickness, of *really* fatty meat. you can see the clear demarcation in cross-section: brisket, thin fat layer, fatty, spongy meat layer (gimme a day and I can get pics if it helps). is this top layer the fat cap I read about? I thought the fat cap was the thin (about 1/8") layer immediately on top of what I'm calling the brisket, or what you see in the midnight cook pic. my lower portion looks just like that. what's the stuff on top? on the outer ends of the cut, this layer isn't there and the slices look like the midnight cook pic, and what I identify as brisket, and they are _incredible_.
in the future, should I look for this layer before cooking (the cut looked like the web pics when raw, I thought, but this would be the first time I've dealt with raw beef other than hamburger or the occasional steak), or was this a strange cut, or should I be removing this top layer after cooking, or...?
all in all, I'm pleased, but if I can improve on this, man, I might be doing this every night.
thanks in advance.
scott
