Brisket Game Plan for Critique

[nepasmoker]

Good Evening:

Tomorrow night I am embarking on my first brisket smoke.  Since purchasing my MES 30" in May, I have smoked pork butt, ribs and wings with good success.   Today I purchased a 13.9lb brisket.  I trimmed the fat to approximately 1/8-1/4".   I think this brought the weight down to around 11-12lbs. Then I applied rub around 6pm.  

My goal is to serve the brisket around 3-4pm on Thursday.  By my estimations, I am expecting this smoke to take 18-24 hours.  So my plan is to put the brisket on around 5pm tomorrow at 225 degrees.  Keep it on the smoker until 1am.  At 1am, I am going to foil the brisket.   Then I'm going to unfoil it around 8-9am and put it in a tinfoil pan to finish.  Does this sound like a reasonable plan?  

Two other questions:

- Should I be mopping the brisket at all?

- Can I do some ribs on the bottom racks in the morning while the brisket is finishing in the pan on the top rack?

Thank you for suggestions.

 

[kc5tpy]

Hello.  I am going to ASSUME you are asking about a packer brisket because of the size.  Well, I would not have trimmed but beside the point.  I would run the temp round 275-300 ( 280-290 if you can be that accurate ).  I would foil by IT of 106-165 IF I was gonna foil but I do not foil.  Having said all that I would follow your plan but foil at IT of 165.  I would say that IF you are going to foil a mop is NOT necessary but if you want to add a certain flavor it ain't gonna hurt it.  My MAIN advice is to write down everything.  Weight, temp, rub, mop, wood, time, foil?, and anything else you can think of including weather conditions.  Next time you will have options to change whatever.  Good luck.  Be sure to let us know how it turns out as we are a nosey bunch, and don't forget the Q-view.  Good luck.  Keep Smokin!

Danny

 

[foamheart]

Howdee Nepa, I am not a smoke guru but I do smoke on a MES30. That being said with your prior smokes there are some basics. You have an electric smoker, you've given up the dry smoke which forms the smoke ring for the convince of a perfect temp. In so doing you get to keep the smoker closed. If the smoker is kept closed your meat will need less fluid. I suggest you leave the door closed and not mop/spritz, but smoking is about your preferences and you making them work.

As to mixing and matching, There are folks here that prefer cooking with a full smoker. One told me it helps with stalls. (shrugs) personal preference. But common sense makes me think that with a 13 pound packer, and 2 racks cut in two pieces can't all fit in an MES30, I maybe wrong but that's a load. If it will fit you can do it.

But remember the key to an electric smoker is to keep the door closed. You have almost perfect temperature control but opening the door causes cycling. The MES will not recover like a stick pit. Or at least mine doesn't.

After all that typing my answers are, I don't mop and sure you can cook anything together. I would look at your MES30 again to see all that meat in there. But these are my preferences. You may disagree. Its the nice thing about smoking, we all do it different.

What ever you do, I hope you have a good smoke and a safe and happy 4th. And your smoke is legendary!