Cut n shoot area, that's the country side of Kingwood tx !!! Sent from my Alcatel_5044R using Tapatalk
Yeah, can't beat the natural taste of good beef all by it self.. sometimes the sauce is not needed I agree there .. Sent from my Alcatel_5044R using Tapatalk
Thats a great article, Jason!! I've always known that there is a quick temp spike when the meat is "done" but didn't quite know why...Even after ten years of BBQ catering...
Google BBQ with Franklin and watch his videos on brisket. He knows brisket as well as anyone. Most hardwoods will work well enough. I use plain hickory most often. When using mesquite I use only a little mixed with oak, hickory or maple as too much mesquite is overpowering. No sauce on brisket when cooking. It is optionally served on the side after slicing. There are three main options with wrapping. 1) don’t. This gives the best bark, but takes the longest and loses most moisture. 2) wrap with foil. Most smoke flavor is absorbed at the beginning of the cook and ALL smoke ring development happens before the meat comes up to temp, so once that is done, you can wrap in foil and stop the evaporative cooling. This is the fastest way to get it done and retains the most liquid, but gives the worst bark. 3) wrap in butcher paper. This is a halfway method. Once the smoke has been absorbed, you wrap in paper instead of foil. It speeds up the cook and reduces evaporation, but not as completely as foil. The biggest issue most people have with brisket is they under cook it. When under done, it seems dry and tough which people assume means over cooked so the next one they under cook even more. Brisket is done when it probes tender and has the consistency of a blob of meat jello. A thermometer will not reliably indicate when it is done and nor will a timer. It is all about look and feel. Over cooked brisket will fall apart when sliced but is still much better than undercooked brisket. Don’t make it too complicated. Start with a GOOD PIECE OF MEAT, trim excess fat but don’t over trim, cover with a simple rub, add heat and cook until tender.
Pecan is from the hickory family. If it is available in your region it is a great smoking wood, if not but you have hickory don’t sweat it.
This is a great example of technology making things harder. Before remote read probe thermometers, pitmasters never even knew there was a stall or that they had to get over it. They knew when it was done based on texture. Now that everyone has a thermometer, they watch the temp rise and then see it suddenly plateau well below the target temp they read online, and they panic! Oh no, it stopped cooking (no it didn’t) it will take days to finish at this rate (no it won’t) I better do SOMETHING (NO!). Low and slow BBQ is about tenderizing a tough piece of meat. The connective tissue that makes it tough breaks down with BOTH time and temperature. There is no “done temp” because the internal temperature of the meat when it is done will depend on the cooking temp, the technique, the specific piece of meat, humidity, position of the planets etc. You can cook a brisket sous vide for 72 hours and have be tender at 140 and you can cook one hot and fast for 3 hours and have it be under done at 210. Once the internal temp climbs above 130 or so it will start to break down and get tender. At higher temps the process goes faster, but it still takes time. Thermometers only tell you temperature, they don’t measure tender. A thermometer can be important to know when your poultry is safe, but it is worse than useless for slow cooked pork or beef. It gives you information that is not helpful* and can only cause you to react in ways that make things worse. Until you learn how to make consistently good brisket you are better off leaving the thermometer in the drawer. * Once you have mastered cooking by feel and have experience with your smoker, you can use a thermometer to better gauge when a particular hunk of meat will be done and adjust your technique or temperature to time it for a certain serving window. Even then, most of the time you are better off starting plenty early and holding the meat in a cooler/cambro or a specialized holding oven.
Before fuel injection, carbs made engines run fine. I don’t believe technology is a bad thing. I find it interesting to know the how’s and why’s. I in no way imply I’m “the man” or my way is the best. Apologies if it came off that way.
Fuel injection does a better job of mixing fuel and air in the optimal proportions. Digital thermometers do not do anything to break down connective tissue or impart flavor better than not having one. If 4 hours into your cook your hunk of meat reads 165, what are you going to do differently than if it read 163 or 167? When the internal temp ticks up from 202 to 203, what are you going to do? I don’t want to say you should throw out the thermometers, but having spent way too much time on too many BBQ forums, I have witnessed an unbelievable number of people struggling with learning to make brisket. 99.99% of the time, their problem is related to using a thermometer and target temperatures.
I COMPLETELY understand where you are coming from Matt. Try being a farmer: everything today is a supposed science! Really...haven't we been raising sheep for like 9000 years? There is actually a pretty big market for smoked meat woods. I sell some to a place nearby that ships around the world. They sell cedar, ash and apple, though apple they always buy, and cedar in regular amounts, but Ash is sporadic at best.
