# First brisket, appreciate direct feedback so next is better



## Danabw (May 29, 2020)

Did my first brisket yesterday. Small piece that I ordered for curbside pickup from local grocery due to covid19, so I wasn't able to choose what I got.  
It was a 3.3lb brisket from Vons. I know very little about  briskets, never brought one home to cook it before.  

1:30PM-ish: Removed from fridge and seasoned 
3PM: Smoker @240, top vent mostly closed, hickory chip in. Brisket goes in and temp probe inserted
5PM:  Brisket is already at 170, temp seemed to rise very fast.  
5-7PM: Stuck between high 160s and 170. Stopped adding hickory chips at 7PM. 
7-8:15: Foil wrapped, went to 196
8:15-8:30: 275: Unwrapped, went down to high 180s 
8:30 - 10:30: Wrapped in foil and towel and in cooler 

*Details: *

The ingénue, resting w/simple rub consisting of black pepper and rub. (Rub suggested to me by chef neighbor ). Rested on counter, 68 degrees before it went into the smoker. I assumed that this seemed more like a hunk of mostly the flat than an actual (super small) brisket. 








Initial temp was 250. During the first 45 minutes I reduced to 230 and 235 for short periods, then left at 240 for the remainder of smoking. I kept going back to the interweb and reading more info on temperatures and getting confused about which was best. Damn interweb. Using simple electric smoker.







Vent opening: It was a little bit more than below, but I left it pretty closed for the whole smoke. I think that may have been one of my mistakes? 






5:00 PM, two hours later. Temp is already 170, and I was unnecessaily worried about it finishing to fast, but of course it then stayed in the low 170's never higher than 175 until 7PM. 







At 7PM I finally wrapped in foil and returned to smoker. By 8:15 it was 196. Removed tin foil, set smoker to 275, and returned to rack to "crisp" a bit. Not sure how much crisping occurred, didn't look/feel too different. When it came out a 8:15 it did look pretty good, I'll give it that. 







Meat was a little dry, especially towards the tip/end where we started slicing. Had I been at a restaurant I would have been disappointed and given it a grade of low B. Not moist, but still pretty tender/easy to pull apart after slicing. As I got into the cut it improved, but clearly not what I had been hoping for. It did get a nice smoke from the hickory chips I used for the first two hours of smoking. 

Thoughts about my next brisket - appreciate any feedback on below, and general suggestions for improvement. 

I liked the rub I used, but open to new suggestions. My typical go-to for beef is simply salt/pepper, but the rub did add a great aroma to the brisket. 
I know I didn't trim the fat enought - I didn't check the depth carefully enough and had about a 3/4" layer on part of the brisket. Next time I need to get it down to a more consistent 1/4".  (However, w/the driest part of the brisket that huge fat-cap turned out to be helpful. :) 
For small briskets is going w/a higher temp like 250 better due to them being more likely to dry out if in the smoker for a longer time at a lower temp?  I was thinking about trying 220 next time...
I think one mistake is not opening the vent to allow more air flow - what's the recommendation when using an electric smoker like mine, and does the recomended amount of venting change over time? 
I think I should have wrapper earlier 5:45 or 6 when the brisket had clearly stalled. Is that right? 
After wrapping should I have increased, decreased, or not changed my temp? (240)
Once it reached 195 after wrapping, should I have held that for a while, or is that "done." ?  I think I would have failed the toothpick test as the meat was drying out so not sure that would have added value for me. 
Next time I think I would skip the attempt to "crisp" things up by unwrapping setting to 275, as noted I didn't see any big change from that. And leaving it in at that point (I was over 5 hours) just seemed too much. 
The wrap and seemed to work well. Only question is whether I need 2 hours of rest for a small cut.


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## bregent (May 29, 2020)

For a brisket that small I would suggest SmokinAl's method:






						BRISKET FLAT, MY WAY
					

It's no secret that a lot of folks have a problem smoking a small well trimmed brisket flat. I to had my struggles for a while, but a couple of years ago I found this method and have been using it ever since. So I would like to share my method with all of you. If you already are successful...




					www.smokingmeatforums.com
				






Danabw said:


> Once it reached 195 after wrapping, should I have held that for a while, or is that "done." ? I think I would have failed the toothpick test as the meat was drying out so not sure that would have added value for me.



Briskets can seem dry if they are undercooked because the collagen hasn't broken down enough. Howver, you said it seemed pretty tender so hard to say. Again, small brisket flats are hard to get right if you cook them the traditional way, so give Al's method a try, or try a full packer.


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## noboundaries (May 29, 2020)

The thing about unwrapping meat in a smoker is that evaporative cooling takes over because the outside of the wrapped meat is saturated with moisture, aka soft bark. Once unwrapped and exposed to the larger volume of smoker air, the moisture evaporates at a rate consistent with the chamber temp. That's why the big temp drop of the meat. 

It's no different than your body temperature dropping when you sweat.  Same thing happens to the meat. You may have got to 196F in the wrapping, but once you unwrapped it, you cooled the meat rather quickly through evaporative cooling. Now you have to smoke/cook it longer to get it back to 196F or beyond.  You could have left the chamber at 240F, or bumped it up to 275F to speed things along after you unwrapped the meat.

Personally, I don't wrap anything in foil unless I want fall apart meat and don't care about the bark. If I do wrap because I'm making something with a chuck roast, I don't unwrap due to evaporative cooling. Butcher paper is kind of a mix between wrapping and not wrapping, but I don't unwrap butcher paper either.

Back when I did wrap, I experimented with wrapping at the stall to wrapping as high as 185F meat IT. Wrapping at the higher temp I got a firmer bark similar to wrapping in butcher paper at the stall. It's still softer than no wrap, but nice.


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## natelive (May 29, 2020)

I usually like to wrap at the END of the stall instead of the beginning, it can spend hours at 160 and why would I wrap earlier if I'm trying to develop bark? I also wrap in butcher paper instead of foil. There's a reason why but I don't remember it, I just know I read it somewhere.
That said, the brisket looks great. I like a mustard layer to hold onto my seasoning as well. Would love to see how a slice hangs over a fork or your finger. Tutuapp 9apps Showbox 
How many pounds was this? This wasn't a whole packer was it? I find for me that even with Aaron Franklin's method, I like to take the point and chunk it out, cover in sauce and let smoke for another hour or two for burnt ends. For me, slices are best when they're from the flat - point is just too fatty to slice for me!


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## flatbroke (May 29, 2020)

Ash from the fireplace with some water  will clean that glass nice and clean


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## gary s (May 29, 2020)

Looks pretty darn good to me

Gary


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## Danabw (May 29, 2020)

Thanks very much 

 bregent
 - off to Al's method. 

I had done searching about for small brisket advice in the last week, kind of embarrassed I didn't find that. Everything is obvious after you see it, of course. :)


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## Danabw (May 29, 2020)

noboundaries said:


> ....Back when I did wrap, I experimented with wrapping at the stall to wrapping as high as 185F meat IT. Wrapping at the higher temp I got a firmer bark similar to wrapping in butcher paper at the stall. It's still softer than no wrap, but nice.



I was suprised how well my bark survived wrapping - it was strong and very solid. I like a softer bark rather than crisp, so I was very happy w/that part of the results. I am going to get some butcher paper to see how that differs for me.



natelive said:


> I usually like to wrap at the END of the stall instead of the beginning, it can spend hours at 160 and why would I wrap earlier if I'm trying to develop bark? I also wrap in butcher paper instead of foil. There's a reason why but I don't remember it, I just know I read it somewhere.
> 
> That said, the brisket looks great. I like a mustard layer to hold onto my seasoning as well. Would love to see how a slice hangs over a fork or your finger.
> 
> How many pounds was this? This wasn't a whole packer was it? I find for me that even with Aaron Franklin's method, I like to take the point and chunk it out, cover in sauce and let smoke for another hour or two for burnt ends. For me, slices are best when they're from the flat - point is just too fatty to slice for me!



This was 3.3lbs, not very big at all, and since I was doing curb-side pickup, a
store employee chose it, rather than me being able to pick the prettiest one. :) What you see was all I got.  I had a nice strong bark at 2 hours in when it was at 170, so I would have been OK w/wrapping at that point, as I was worried that such a thin cut was going to dry out if it went too many hours to break the stall. Not knowing the future is really annoying. :)

The next time we eat some more of it (tomorrow, tonight was homemade muffulettas made on homebaked muffuletta bread!). 

I'll try to remember to get a fork/finger shot w/a strip from the brisket. 



flatbroke said:


> Ash from the fireplace with some water  will clean that glass nice and clean


Thanks for the tip. I like having the window, but as you obviously saw it's quite a mess. I'd like to give your tip a try, but being in SoCal our fireplace hasn't seen much action in several years. We have a cottage on the east coast where we meet up w/family members every year, maybe I can bring some ashes home from there... :)



gary s said:


> Looks pretty darn good to me
> 
> Gary


Thanks! I also liked how it looked, and my family was impressed, and that's what matters most. :D


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## GaryHibbert (May 29, 2020)

gary s said:


> Looks pretty darn good to me
> 
> Gary



Now that's a compliment to be remembered!!  Gary has been smoking brisket for decades, and he's a true Master of the Brisket.  I'd suggest you do a search here for brisket, posted by gary s v   ( 

 gary s
 ) )and read all his posts.  That's what I did before I smoked my first brisket in my MES 30 and it turned out fantastic.
BTW, ALWAYS leave your top vent wide open.
Gary


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## Danabw (May 29, 2020)

GaryHibbert said:


> Now that's a compliment to be remembered!!  Gary has been smoking brisket for decades, and he's a true Master of the Brisket.  I'd suggest you do a search here for brisket, posted by gary s v   (
> 
> gary s
> ) )and read all his posts.  That's what I did before I smoked my first brisket in my MES 30 and it turned out fantastic.
> ...


Thanks for providing me context on the compliment! :) Post printed and framed.  I will the execute the suggested search, and line up my reading for the next few days. 

And thanks for the feedback on the top vent, very good to know.


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