The BBQ Thread

I'm bumming a bit because I wanted to use my big red Assassin smoker, but they are calling for severe boomers today and since big red is my BBQ pride and joy, I never expose him to storms.

This morning, I had to switch it up and use my smaller pellet smoker that's under cover. The brisket was almost too big for that.



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Ashburn Dave said:
Today is the big day for me. Like Mark's dry run for his OBX trip, my brisket a week or two ago was my dry run for my fantasy football league draft which is tomorrow. I'm commish of a local league that used to be all my bud's from SallieMae. The league is 35 years old and we get together at my house for the draft. This year we're doing brisket.

I'm a little nervous this time though since the smallest brisket Costco had yesterday was 23 lbs. I've never smoked a 23 lb'er before. At least I have two days to get it done.

My last picture has my timeline for both days. I used hot sauce for the binder, goldies for the rub and added some extra pepper on top.

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Shit....after trimming...it's probably a 17-18 lb brisket.. :LOL:
 
You might be right about it being 18 lbs now but at least I turned that lost meat into liquid gold. I wish someone had shown me how to make my own tallow years ago.

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This was my first boat and initially I was loving it since it seemed the perfect solution to keeping the edges and sides from drying out.

But then I realized it was trapping all my spritzing and my brisket was sitting in a puddle. I had to use the turkey baster to suck up the puddle.

The other problem with the boat is that the foil stuck to the bottom of the brisket, so I had to peal it off which was a pain in the ass.

At least the bark is better than my last one.

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Finished the smoke around 2am and then let it cool down to 175 F, wrapped in foil, and started the hot hold at 3am.

We'll eat around 7pm so that will be a 16 hour hold to juicify itself.

Oven set to 150 F and meat holding just under.

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Ashburn Dave said:
Testing my new hot box this week. Brisket to follow next week. So far so good. The only negative is that it runs hotter than its set setting. Some reviewers had pointed this out but that wasn't a showstopper for me since I can work around that. A setting of 134 on the oven equates to 150 degrees. Temperature swings are only 1 degree also, so I'm impressed so far.

Now the whole purpose of the long hold (12+hours) is so that I don't have to stay up all night tending the brisket to have it ready for a 6pm dinner. Below is what I'll test next week which will end up being a 17 hour hold. After 20 hours the brisket starts to mush.

1pm Smoke it 12 hours naked
1am Rest on counter until internal temp is 165 degrees (about one hour)
2am Tightly wrap brisket with tallow and hold in hot box at 150 degrees
7pm - Slice and eat

The only negative is being up until 2am but that is an improvement over starting a brisket at 2am to have it ready for dinner.

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It occurs to me that I have a ‘keep warm’ setting on my oven that is probably just right for long holds. I have a 15 lb brisket I am going to play with this weekend but have a few questions.

You mention you did a 12 hour naked smoke. Are you fully smoking the brisket up to 200-205 and THEN letting it cool to 165 before wrapping and THEN doing your 12 hr hold or are you pulling the brisket off the smoker at a lower temp?
 
Boone said:
It occurs to me that I have a ‘keep warm’ setting on my oven that is probably just right for long holds. I have a 15 lb brisket I am going to play with this weekend but have a few questions.

You mention you did a 12 hour naked smoke. Are you fully smoking the brisket up to 200-205 and THEN letting it cool to 165 before wrapping and THEN doing your 12 hr hold or are you pulling the brisket off the smoker at a lower temp?
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Yes, to fully smoking it up to 205-208 on the point.

Yes, to resting it naked on the counter until IT is 165 ...BUT... I didn't like how close the IT came to 140 F. The IT kept dropping in the oven all the way down to 142 my first try and then it worked its way back closer to 150 F a few hours later. Last night I rested it on the counter until 175 F IT and by the time I got it wrapped and, in the oven, the lowest IT it hit was 147 F.

Yes, to full foil wrap after the counter rest to 175 F IT and then into the oven.

This is how I've done two briskets it was not a lot of fun last night dicking around removing the foil boat. I'm tempted the next time to build my bark on smoker, wrap with butcher paper until 205-208 F, rest on counter in paper, and then into the oven once 175 F IT. Not sure if that would work but I can't believe these Texas joints are wasting time with boats and then rewraps.
 
Yeah, I think I will do my usual method - wrap in butcher paper at 170, back on smoker to 205, then rest still in butcher paper till it’s 180 internal - but I’m gonna wrap foil over the butcher paper before I put it in oven (I think that might help keep moisture from escaping) I am probably going to do more like 8 hrs in oven and see how it comes out.
 
Boone said:
Yeah, I think I will do my usual method - wrap in butcher paper at 170, back on smoker to 205, then rest still in butcher paper till it’s 180 internal - but I’m gonna wrap foil over the butcher paper before I put it in oven (I think that might help keep moisture from escaping) I am probably going to do more like 8 hrs in oven and see how it comes out.
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Less is more sometimes, especially as we get older and will be curious how that goes. Good luck!
 
So Ashburn Dave, I actually don’t have a ‘keep warm’ option on my oven, it’s a stove option. But my oven can be set as low as 170. Do you think that’s too hot for a long hold?
 
Boone said:
So Ashburn Dave, I actually don’t have a ‘keep warm’ option on my oven, it’s a stove option. But my oven can be set as low as 170. Do you think that’s too hot for a long hold?
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From everything I've seen on YT, 170 F is too high for an extended hold. Yes, there were lots of folks using their ovens at 170 F but not for 12+ hours. Most of them were using that when they finished up a few hours early so less than 5 hours.
 
I think what I’ll do is, wrap the already wrapped brisket in foil and maybe leave it in the oven at 170 for 4-5 hours, then move to cooler. Should still get some continued break down of fats and connective tissue for that time period). If it’s foil wrapped I shouldn’t dry it out l.
 
Hell - it will probably stay above 150 for hours in the cooler
 
Will loosen the butcher paper when I pull it off the smoker and hit it with some tallow before I rewrap and put it in the oven
 
Have you guys ever smoked chuck roast? I saw a video where they did smoked chuck roast for 3+ hours. Than he put it into a pan with the sauce and veg, and let it cook in the oven for another hour or two. Than he pulled it all apart. Kind of the same idea as pulled Carolina barbecue pork. It looked really good
 
RedWolf said:
Have you guys ever smoked chuck roast? I saw a video where they did smoked chuck roast for 3+ hours. Than he put it into a pan with the sauce and veg, and let it cook in the oven for another hour or two. Than he pulled it all apart. Kind of the same idea as pulled Carolina barbecue pork. It looked really good
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This is one of my favorite recipes

Pepper Stout Beef Sandwiches

4lb - Chuck Roast
2 - Big Bell Peppers sliced
1 - Big Red Onion sliced
3 - Big Jalapenos Sliced seed and all
6 - Garlic Cloves mince
1/4 - cup Worcestershire Sauce
1 - 12oz Bottle Guinness Extra Stout
Kosher Salt and Black Pepper

Heavily season Chuck roast with salt and pepper and cook on a grill or smoker indirect in the 245º-260º range. You can add smoke wood if you prefer, I did not. Cook until the internal temperature reaches 165º.

While the roast is cooking, add the remaining ingredients in 13 x 9 or similar aluminum pan or oven safe pan.

Once the roast hits 165º, place into pan directly on top of vegetable mixture and cover tightly with foil. Cook roast in smoker or oven at 350º for 2.5-3hrs or until roast is fork tender. Once meat is tender, shred all of the meat in the liquid and mix thoroughly and continue to cook until the liquid reduces by half.

Serve meat on hard rolls with your choice of cheese. We used pepper jack on some and gorgonzola on some and liked both, but provolone, swiss, etc., would work perfectly fine. Horseradish would be another good condiment.
 
So, my long hold brisket experiment has gone semi-awry already. Here's what I did (so far). I aggressively trimmed my 15 lb brisket. I'm thinking it was probably 12 lbs by the time I was done. I used yellow mustard and Texas Pete as a binder and used kosher salt, black pepper, garlic powder, and celery seed for my rub. Got my Big Green Egg going last night and the brisket went in at 10pm with the temp steady at 225. Post oak chunks for smoke.

I got up at 6 am figuring it would have hit 165-170 by that time and I would wrap and continue cooking it. But to my shock, the brisket was at 200-205. I'm not sure how it got there in just 8 hours but it's happened to me before. My first thought was, maybe it climbed up closer to 300 degrees in the night, but the temp was under 200 when I went out this morning, so I think that's unlikely. I also noticed that there wasn't a lot of bark. Usually on the Big Green Egg, especially if you have a slightly higher temp than desired, you will get a very notable bark.

Bottom line, I've had briskets stall forever before, and I've had briskets cook much faster than seems possible. I think it's very dependent on the individual characteristics of the brisket.

Anyway, back to this one. Seeing my brisket was already at 200-205, I obviously pulled it off the smoker. I preheated my oven to 170 degrees, and I wrapped the brisket tightly first in pink butcher paper, and then in foil. As it was early, and I got thrown off my plan due to the brisket being at temp, I totally forgot about cooling it down to 160-170 before putting it in the oven. I thought about adding some tallow to it before wrapping, but I didn't care for how greasy it made my brisket the last time I used it, so I decided not to use it. I put the double-wrapped brisket in the oven on a sheet pan, with a pan full of water beneath it. I'm not sure that will do a lot given how wrapped the brisket is, but it was recommended in the reading I did, so...

I am going to keep the brisket in the oven for 8 hours, then pull it, wrap it in blankets, and put it into a cooler for another 4 hours.

Then we shall see what we shall see. It may be amazing. It may come out hard as a brick and inedible. I really don't know what to expect. My biggest concern is how hot that oven really is when I set it at 170. Given how quickly the brisket got to 200 overnight, I know there is still a lot of fat in it to be rendered. That makes me think everything is going to be fine and this will turn out to be a very good cook. But we will see.

I know most folks stumbling into this thread will think 'Good lord, these guys are detail freaks - just cook the damned thing!' But for those of us obsessed with BBQ, it is a quasi-religious endeavor ... #IYKYK
 
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