Brisket cook on Saturday for dinner on Sunday night

[FF Cory]

Fellas I'm gonna do a brisket cook on Saturday for dinner on Sunday night. I have done a couple on my 590 and had great success. I will cook to 165, wrap in paper and finish to 203ish. I want to reheat it for dinner at the fire house on Sunday night. I want to leave it whole in order to slice it there. Thoughts on leaving it in the butcher paper and double wrapping in foil for transport and reheat? Or should I cook to a lesser temp to prevent over cook? Unwrap from the paper and re-wrap with foil for reheat? Thank is advance.

 

[Waterboy]

If you have a counter top roaster you can hold a brisket for a long time in that. I plan to cook a brisket Saturday for Easter dinner. I’m going to put the brisket on mid to late morning hoping to finish sometime around midnight. I use the counter top roaster oven to hold the brisket at 150 for as long as I need to. This will be the longest hold I’ve done (12-14 hours). I’ve held a brisket 9 hours this way before and it worked great. I do keep an ambient probe and a meat probe going to monitor temps.

I leave the brisket in the paper and have wrapped in either foil or plastic wrap (after letting it cool a bit). I do add smoked tallow when I wrap and that has prevented any drying out as you don’t have humidity control in a roaster oven.

 

[Pacman]

What time do you have to start your shift on Sunday? I've had no issues cooking overnight, leaving it wrapped whole, put it in a cooler wrapped in moving blankets, but I served at lunch time.

I like @Waterboy 's idea. You could also keep it in a warm oven without much ill-effect.

Thinking outside the box, depending on your run volume, you could cook to the stall and finish in an oven at the station.

 

[FF Cory]

If you have a counter top roaster you can hold a brisket for a long time in that. I plan to cook a brisket Saturday for Easter dinner. I’m going to put the brisket on mid to late morning hoping to finish sometime around midnight. I use the counter top roaster oven to hold the brisket at 150 for as long as I need to. This will be the longest hold I’ve done (12-14 hours). I’ve held a brisket 9 hours this way before and it worked great. I do keep an ambient probe and a meat probe going to monitor temps.

I leave the brisket in the paper and have wrapped in either foil or plastic wrap (after letting it cool a bit). I do add smoked tallow when I wrap and that has prevented any drying out as you don’t have humidity control in a roaster oven

If you have a counter top roaster you can hold a brisket for a long time in that. I plan to cook a brisket Saturday for Easter dinner. I’m going to put the brisket on mid to late morning hoping to finish sometime around midnight. I use the counter top roaster oven to hold the brisket at 150 for as long as I need to. This will be the longest hold I’ve done (12-14 hours). I’ve held a brisket 9 hours this way before and it worked great. I do keep an ambient probe and a meat probe going to monitor temps.

I leave the brisket in the paper and have wrapped in either foil or plastic wrap (after letting it cool a bit). I do add smoked tallow when I wrap and that has prevented any drying out as you don’t have humidity control in a roaster oven

My plan is to let is set and cool before the aluminum foil wrap. It's all about timing so I can get it right before I go on duty and then start the reheat process.

 

[Jim6820]

@Waterboy and @Pacman nailed it! You can hold brisket for a long time and it will still be great. I’ve held brisket for up to 9 hours in a well-insulated soft cooler.

My technique is to leave the brisket in the paper wrap, place it in a foil pan with foil lightly draped over it (not sealed around the pan) and place the pan in the soft cooler with a folded beach towel covering it. Close up the cooler securely and the brisket will hold for hours.

Good luck on your cook.

 

[FF Cory]

What time do you have to start your shift on Sunday? I've had no issues cooking overnight, leaving it wrapped whole, put it in a cooler wrapped in moving blankets, but I served at lunch time.

I like @Waterboy 's idea. You could also keep it in a warm oven without much ill-effect.

Thinking outside the box, depending on your run volume, you could cook to the stall and finish in an oven at the station.

I work on Friday and then on Sunday. My cook will start when I get home on Saturday at 0700. my start time is 0700 for shift.

 

[Pacman]

I think I'd take the time you need to leave home to get to work at 0700, estimate your cooking time and subtract an hour (for wiggle room) for your start time. Then I'd leave wrapped, throw in an ice chest with extra insulation, go to work. When I did my weird timing cook for my guys, the brisket was still hot to touch and juicy when I started slicing.

For reference my timing for a 17.7 lb Wagyu brisket (before trimming) was on at 225 degrees at 1400 the day before, didn't mess with pit temperature as I didn't want to add a variable (although I checked when I got up to see if I needed to crank up the heat). Wrapped at the stall just after midnight, and pulled everything and headed in at 0600. Served at around 1300 to rave reviews.

 

[Jim6820]

Off topic for just a moment; thanks to all you firefighters out there—we appreciate what you do! THANK YOU!

We now return you to the regular programming.

 

[Greg Jones]

I’m late to the conversation, but let me add something that is consistent with what others have said on the topic. My suggestion for cooking brisket is to always expect that it will take longer to cook than what is a ‘normal’ time. I recently cooked a 14# brisket in my normal method, and it took 22 hours from start to finish including planned rest time. It really could have benefited for 24 hours to be optimal. That was the longest brisket cook I’ve ever done, but fortunately it was a) only the wife and myself and b), I had planned on letting it rest in a cooler for 4 hours.

 

[agaffer]

I agree with Greg. You can't know ahead of time how long it will take to cook. But, you don't really need to. Personally, I wouldn't start cooking it until 8 or 9pm. I assume that to get up shower, dress, get to work that you need at least an hour. So, instead of getting up at 6 am get up earlier. Wrap the brisket, no matter what the temp. (it will probably still be in the stall). Put it in a foil pan and finish the cook at the fire house in a 225° oven. Once finished, if your oven has a proofing setting keep it there at 150° for as long as you want, even to the next day. If not, put it in a cooler with towels for the rest of the day. Check the temp of the meat at least an hour before you want to eat it. It may need to be taken out of the cooler to decrease the temp to 145° which is optimal for carving and eating.

 

[FF Cory]

What time do you have to start your shift on Sunday? I've had no issues cooking overnight, leaving it wrapped whole, put it in a cooler wrapped in moving blankets, but I served at lunch time.

I like @Waterboy 's idea. You could also keep it in a warm oven without much ill-effect.

Thinking outside the box, depending on your run volume, you could cook to the stall and finish in an oven at the station.

I start shift at 0700. I wake up at 0400 on duty days to workout before my shift. I will concentrate on dinner before the workout. We have updated our dinner to Tuesday considering we had a ham donated for Easter dinner. I like the idea of the stall temp cook. What temp do you suggest, if I finish it in the oven, wrapped, to hit 203ish at 1630, rest for 2hrs and serve at 1830ish?

 

[FF Cory]

Off topic for just a moment; thanks to all you firefighters out there—we appreciate what you do! THANK YOU!

We now return you to the regular programming.

Thank you sir. It is my pleasure to do what I do. Gotta love what you do or you're just wasting time!

 

[FF Cory]

Sorry fells. Had a schedule change as of yesterday due to a donation of a ham to my station for Easter dinner. Gonna move it to Tuesday. Monday will be the cook. I have it trimmed and resting with beef broth injected. I will have my wife pull it out of the fridge on Monday morning at 0600. I will get home around 0730. I'll inject again to shore up the broth that was lost. I'll start the 590 when I get home and probably hit the rack about 0800.

 

[FF Cory]

I agree with Greg. You can't know ahead of time how long it will take to cook. But, you don't really need to. Personally, I wouldn't start cooking it until 8 or 9pm. I assume that to get up shower, dress, get to work that you need at least an hour. So, instead of getting up at 6 am get up earlier. Wrap the brisket, no matter what the temp. (it will probably still be in the stall). Put it in a foil pan and finish the cook at the fire house in a 225° oven. Once finished, if your oven has a proofing setting keep it there at 150° for as long as you want, even to the next day. If not, put it in a cooler with towels for the rest of the day. Check the temp of the meat at least an hour before you want to eat it. It may need to be taken out of the cooler to decrease the temp to 145° which is optimal for carving and eating.

Thank you. I need to do some math considering the day change and new start time. I think I'm overthinking it but to screw up a fire house dinner sticks with you for a long time. even though I have 29 yrs, it will still stick with me. lol!

 

[FF Cory]

If it helps with your thoughts I have a 13.6lb choice packer. I assume after trimming I will be around 10lbs or less.

 

[agaffer]

I forgot about this thread. How did the brisket turn out?