Brisket Mistakes to Avoid
Brisket Mistakes To Avoid
- Cook Temperature -- if using a kamado grill target a temperature of 225 degrees Farenheit
- Rub - Keep it simple, salt & pepper. If using a pellet cooker which doesn't impart as much smoke on the meat you can supplement with more spices
- Not allowing enough time before you have to serve it. Each brisket is different. Add 2.5 hours to your cook time to be safe
- Not allowing enough time to rest. This helps with moisture and tenderness. Minimum is 1 hours, strive for at least 2 hours of rest
- If cook is <8 hours can put directly in the cooler, stay hot and slowly come down in temp
- If cook is 8-12 hours, let brisket down to 180 degrees, then to cooler
- If cook is 12+ hours, let brisket come down to 165 degrees, then to cooler
- Don't change too much
- Don't change everything from last cook you tried (temperature, rub, injection, wood, water pan). You won't know which affected the cook (good/bad) vs. the last time
- Five key things to look for before wrapping the meat
- Color --> proxy for how much smoke flavor. Darker yields more smoke flavor
- Bark build is a necessary pre-condition
- Evaporation --> want the brisket to sweat out water, shrink about 40%. If don't allow to sweat out enough, will fill wrap with lots of moisture. Create soup that washes off the bark
- Fat render --> fat on top turns yellow, when you poke it there is no resistance
- Temperature --> not the end all be all, just one component. Typically check the other 4 things first. As a fail safe, generally wrap around 175-185 degrees, but could be as low as 160 and as high as 195.
- When spraying brisket, don't spray the fat. The point is to protect the meat. You want fat to render, so spraying is counter-productive.
- Over/under smoking. Know your cooker
- Avoid wild temperature swings
- Getting low quality meat
- Don't have to get Wagyu. At a minimum get "Choice," you can't make good brisket with Select. If can get Prime, get Prime
- Wrapping improperly
- Whatever using (foil or butcher paper) do it well. Make it nice and tight.
- Improperly trimming the brisket
- Bad idea to try and trim off all the fat, can cause the meat to come out dry
- Don't be reluctant to trim off parts of the brisket. Don't leave a piece on the brisket that will just dry up and burn. When trimming the flat, be merciless.