Can I Do a decent brisket on a Bull?

[jstarnes]

I love my Bull. I cooked some 10+ St. Louis today. I have great success with many cuts. The versatility is unmatched: salmon, veal, lamb racks, burgers, roasts, shoulders, etc. But my briskets have not been good. Is it just me?

 

[Waterboy]

I think you can. I’ve turned out some excellent briskets on my 700 (and a few clunkers). What is it you aren’t happy with?

 

[Jim6820]

I love my Bull. I cooked some 10+ St. Louis today. I have great success with many cuts. The versatility is unmatched: salmon, veal, lamb racks, burgers, roasts, shoulders, etc. But my briskets have not been good. Is it just me?

I don't know why you wouldn't be able to do an excellent brisket on your Bull; I have done some really good ones on my smaller Trailblazer/RT-340. Are you cooking to temperature or probe tenderness feel? What temperature are you cooking at? How much rest are you giving them after they are pulled from the grill?

Briskets do require a little attention to detail. What problems are you experiencing?

 

[SmokeZilla]

Not trying to steal the show and I have other posts on brisket but here is a copy of my recent post on 30 day aged brisket flat. I like the full packers (check my name for that information but this may be helpful:


Great thread and discussion. I put a 30 day wet aged Brisket Flat on this morning at around 09:15hrs. I did full smoke (~180F) for the first 30 minutes, changed the temp to 250F and let it ride. I’m 7 hours into it and will provide an update when I clear the stall. (FYI, I injected so it may take a while.). I am hopeful that I can offer my opinions since I have done many Briskets over the years on my Bull and this is the first “wet aged” I have tried.

All right smokers and cookers. I have to say the brisket came out fantastic! I wouldn’t have believed brisket could sit in its own juices for that long and not mold, turn rancid or degrade, but I couldn’t tell any patent defects existed other than a stronger beef smell for the ingredients. I will have to put in a disclaimer that YMMV but my process is detailed below:

I started with a choice brisket purchased from Costco on 02/02/23. This brisket was still in the original cryo-packaging unaltered and never opened. I checked it thoroughly to make sure I didn’t detect any voids or that it did not have any areas where the sealing process trapped any visible proteins when it was heat sealed. I also ”washed the packaging to make sure any store based contamination risks could be mitigated. I put the brisket in the freezer to ensure any active yucky stuff would also be killed by the freezing. I then removed the brisket from the freezer on May 20th and placed it a refrigerator laying it flat to ensure equal distribution of the juices. (Note: The days count is approximated as it did take a couple for the transition from frozen to thawed.) (I did however, over the next ~30 days flip the brisket flat periodically but did the final flip in a manner that kept the top (meat, non-fat cap) side immersed in the fluids, upside down for reference.) I removed the protein on July 1st, trimmed it, dry seasoned it (50P-25S-25G with a decent dusting of smoked Cayenne) and returned it to the fridge for approximately 24 hours under a lightly tented parchment paper cover. I removed the brisket from the fridge and placed it on a counter in the morning of the cook so the temperature could get closer to ambient before placing it on the Bull. Prior to putting it on the bull I used my ”secret sauce” injection mix to pump up the brisket to prevent premature drying since this was only the flat and my experience with choice grade shows there isn’t enough interconenctive tissues and marbling to sustain the longer cook times. I then put it on at low, maximum smoke (~180F) mode, for 30 minutes. I then moved the temp up to 250F and let the good times roll. Once smoking, I did open the chamber 3 times to spritz the beast with a combo secret injection, apple juice and water. The cook took ~7 hours to clear the stall at about 165F, then I painted the peach paper with beef tallow, wrapped the brisket and put it back on the smoker until it hit and internal temperature of 191-195F depending on where you measured the temps. I removed the brisket, then rested it for 3 hours in the existing peach paper wrapped in saran wrap to capture all the heat, then wrapped in a towel. (Note: The plastic wrap will change the bark slightly but at that point, the peach paper is so saturated that I can’t tell if it really does any harm.)

I apologize in advance if I omitted some of the details as this post is getting quite long. I also purposely left off cooking times as each protein will be on its own path and if you are cooking exclusively based on times I provide, you may miss the best opportunity for success. (Remember how many ribs have been destroyed using the 3-2-1 method, lol?). Let me know if you need any additional details.

 

[randman1]

I'm 2 for 4 in the brisket cooks. The flats on the two misses were damn near inedible. Very dry and mostly tasteless. The points were actually fairly good but didn't knock my socks off. I was rather disappointed and searched for a better method. The two good cooks were quite good after some adjustments. A couple of changes made a big difference:

• Dry brine 24 hours in advance. Actually, all my brisket cooks were prepared this way and I will continue to do it. This means (to me at least) that dry brining is not a game changer, but only a helper
• Separation of point and flat - This allows me to use different methods and even cook times for each muscle. It also has reduced total cook time from ~14 hours to about 10
• Fat cap DOWN - This allows spritzing the meat side about every hour after the first 3 hours of cooking. I use beef broth or stock. I feel this is a large contributor to a good brisket
• Injection - I feel this is #1 or #2 (just behind spritzing) contributor for a juicy flat and makes the point simply superb
• Wrap - My first brisket had way to much smoke, it was horrible. I found 6 - 8 hours of smoke is plenty, especially if the point and flat are separated. Include plenty of spritz liquid in the wrap too.

For my last brisket, 2 weeks ago, rather than wrapping, I actually put both the flat and point in separate pans. I added about 1/4" of beef stock and covered tightly with foil. I increased the temp from 235 to 300 (note that this is grate temp using a meat probe clipped to the grate, not internal temp as displayed in the controller). This seemed to braise the brisket to bring up to an internal temp of ~205. It came out the best so far by a large margin. Smokey and bold beef flavored. The point was out of control yummy.

I guess this is the long way of answering your question. Yes, you can do a great brisket on the Bull. Learn from any mistakes, compile advice, and make adjustments. Most of all, enjoy the journey.

 

[jstarnes]

Thanks for the replies. I am going to try another brisket soon and will post how it goes. One problem may be the actual inside temperature of my Bull. How do you calibrate that and how do you calibrate the probes.

 

[randman1]

I'm unaware of any probe calibration. However, I simply use a "second opinion". I use one of the meat probes clipped to the grate (somewhere in the center if possible) and compare that reading with the controller's reading. I typically see about a 15 degree difference with the grate probe being the lower. When I first got started with smoking, I only used the controller temp reading and often wondered why my cooks took longer than articles I read on the 'net or didn't come out as expected. After adding the second probe at grate level, my cooks improved quite a bit. My setpoint for brisket, for example, is usually 245. The grate probe will read about 230. Note that the difference I see is generally higher when opening the lid to spritz, add veggies, etc. The longer the lid remains closed, the closer the grate and controller temp get. So if I don't intend to open the lid much, or at all, during the cook, I may lower the setpoint to 235.

When I first started, I took a lot of notes. Most of which related to time and temp during the cook. As a result, I don't use the meat probes at all but rather rely on estimated time and an instant read ThermoPro temp gauge to check. So it was only natural to repurpose the meat probes for some other beneficial use.