Jeff, I just finished reading the third entry of your five day course in smoking. I think I've done about everything you talked about before at one time or another. When I do brisket or any large piece of meat, I sop the meat every time I turn it, which in the first four hours is about every 30 minutes. I make a sop out of vegetable oil, onions, Garlic, Margarine, vinegar, beer (Optional), either soy sauce or worchestershire sauce, salt, course ground black pepper, a jalapeno, or serano cut up (Optional), and a piece of lemon. I chop up half a large onion,. I use about a cup of oil but just pour enough in to cover the bottom of the sauce pan at first. Then I heat it and sautee the onions and a couple cloves of garlic in it. Then I add the rest of the oil to the pot, throw in a stick of margarine or butter and let it melt. Then add vinegar and beer, If you don't want beer, just add tap water. Bring it to boil and add the rest of the ingredients. Boil for a couple minutes and keep warm for sopping meat. This not only keeps the meat from drying out, but adds flavor and helps tenderize the meat. Anyway, That's a pretty standard way to baste meat used here in Texas.
What's your thoughts on this? I'm here to learn more. If you or anyone have suggestions to my procedure please let me know and I will try it. This is the way I was taught and I didn't go to a culinary school to learn this. I just winged it, but it seems to work. But I'm open to any suggestions.