Brisket advice

[kad1979]

All, I am looking for some advice. I am going to smoke my first brisket on my KK tonight into tomorrow. I bought a beautiful 11 lb brisket. In an effort to not completely screw up a beautiful piece of meat I want to ask a few questions. Here is what I am thinking:

-Rub, none...just salt and pepper

-Grill temp- 225

-Internal temp- taking the meat to 190-200

-planning on 1.5 hours per lb. 16 hours total

-fat cap up while cooking

One question. Should I left the beef come to room temperature before putting it on the KK?

Any other bits of advice would be greatly appreciated!

[Tucker]

Re: Brisket advice

First, do yourself a big favor and search the forum for brisket.

there is ALOT of info.

I usually put a rub on my briskets using a wet rub 1st to hold the dry.

i always cook fat down. the fat does not "seep" into the meat as it cooks, it just runs over it.

I used to do low-n-slows for brisket, not anymore... i do the hot-n-fast method, which is detailed in the forum. Please check the posts for detail as i may not capture them all here.

cooker at 350, cook naked on indirect heat until internal hits 160, take it off, wrap in foil, back on at 350 and cook approx 2hr 20min more until internal hits the 180-190 mark.

Best brisket we have had has been hot-n-fast.

good luck, enjoy and remember, the worst mistakes on a KK are better than the best outcomes on other cookers.

[LindaFehrmann]

Re: Brisket advice

For an 11lb brisket, what would be a ballpark figure as far as time goes before the foil???

[Paswesley]

Re: Brisket advice

That absolutely depends on the temp of the meat. Variables such as the temp of the meat when the cook begins, the amount of fat versus muscle and connective tissues, and the outside temp, make it hard to predict the amount of time it will take. Send a PM to Cook_Shack or Doc Mguerra and see what they have to say. Until you hear from them, do a forum search with the key words "foiling brisket" and you will find a wealth of relevant posts. Good luck, and good eating!

[kad1979]

Re: Brisket advice

Damn, my KK let me down for the first time. I fired it up yesterday at 4:00 pm. After getting it dialed in to 225 I put the meat on at 6:00 pm. It was rock steady at 11:00 pm when I went to bed. Meat temp was at 145. I woke up this morning (6:30am) to a cold KK and meat temp of 125. I am guessing that I lost fire sometime shortly after 11:00. Got her fired back up again, this should be interesting. I'm guessing I have beef jerkey when all is said and done. I've done probably a dozen and a half low and slows since getting the KK with great results. Anyone ever lose fire?

[DennisLinkletter]

Re: Brisket advice

Damn' date=' my KK let me down for the first time. I fired it up yesterday at 4:00 pm. After getting it dialed in to 225 I put the meat on at 6:00 pm. It was rock steady at 11:00 pm when I went to bed. Meat temp was at 145. I woke up this morning (6:30am) to a cold KK and meat temp of 125. I am guessing that I lost fire sometime shortly after 11:00. Got her fired back up again, this should be interesting. I'm guessing I have beef jerkey when all is said and done. I've done probably a dozen and a half low and slows since getting the KK with great results. Anyone ever lose fire?[/quote']

Back to basics.. there are only two factors to your fire/burn.. Air and Fuel/Charcoal

The culprit is usually lack of airflow.. This usually happens when you have small pieces of charcoal and you forget to shake out the ash from the previous cook. As more ash is created it can't fall thru and suddenly there is no airflow and your burn dies.

Fuel can also have the following issues.. If you regularly grill at high temps, put out the fuel and then use it again and again and again.. you will be left with charcoal with very little volatiles. This charcoal will be more and more difficult to light and will create very little or no vapor, so your meat will not have much charcoal flavor.

This volatiles deleted material will be tough to light and need more contact /heat to transfer the burn from piece to piece.

For low and slow cooks where you want the most charcoal vapor and cook stability I recommend using fresh charcoal. Use that old charcoal for over 350 cooks where vapor is not a factor. This includes cheap over carbonized charcoal that hardly comes to flame at higher temps and produces very little smoke..

[Paswesley]

Re: Brisket advice

I have lost fire a few times in my two years with Mable. It is always due to my error. Heat rises, fire produces heat, but fire needs fuel and oxygen. In a low and slow at the temp you mention, given the info you provided, your fire may already have begun starving out before you went to bed. Remember, the KK heat soaks at a certain temp, in your case it was 225 degrees. That heat drops very slowly, espescially if supported by a slowly dying fire. For the KK to be cold, 7.5 hours later, but the meat still at 125, the oxygen starvation that Dennis describes is the only answer that satisfies what happened. It wasn't the cooker's fault, nor yours. Blame it on Physics!

[kad1979]

Re: Brisket advice

Thanks guys for the info!! Guess what, I had a little old charcoal in the basket. Not a ton but definitely old stuff...

Here is the brisket...internal temp at 165. This should be an interesting result!

[kad1979]

Re: Brisket advice

I am dumbfounded!! I thought I screwed this thing up and look at the results, I wish you guys could taste it... UNREAL!!!

[DennisLinkletter]

Re: Brisket advice

Great smoke ring too..

Oh one more problem.. moist or wet charcoal. Charcoal is hygroscopic which means it will readily absorb moisture.

If your cook burns down into this moist charcoal at low temps it will die. If you also have a cook that won't get over 200º check the exhaust for steam.. this is common here in Bali