My first Brisket success

[Carter]

Well I finally got around to trying Brisket Bradley style on Sunday.  I followed WTS's Brisket 101 pretty closely with a few minor modifications, but I wanted to post what I came up with.

First of all.  This is what I bought.  3.5 pound brisket piece.  Not sure exactly what it is (flat?), but I've had a tough time finding whole packer briskets up here in Toronto or explaining to the butcher what I want, so I just went for this one because it seemed to have quite a bit of fat.  I got it at No Frills for any Canadians reading.  The one near my house has quite a decent butcher shop in it.  I've also attached 4 views of it.  If someone wouldn't mind telling me what I've bought, it would be really helpful.









On Saturday morning, I placed the meat in a marinade.  I used the Dallas Dandy Marinade from Smoke and Spice without the liquid smoke.



On Sunday morning while I was warming up the smoker I applied the Wild Willy's Number One-derful Rub, also from Smoke and Spice and recommended by WTS.



We had a lot of rain on Saturday and they were calling for more of the same Sunday, and there was no way I was going to be rained out so I set up this tarp.  I know it's a bit of a hack job, but hey, you do what you gotta do.  It didn't start to rain until 5:30, about a half an hour after I decided it probably wasn't going to rain and took the tarp down.  Fortunately the meat was done. 







I followed WTS's recipe pretty closely, but instead of bringing the meat inside and putting it in the oven, I used the Bradley the whole time.  Instead I decided to set up a roasting pan underneath the meat with a little apple juice in it to catch the drippings.  I did this after I was done smoking.  I used 3 hours of mesquite by the way.  The meat was in the smoker from 8am until 5:30 and as I said it was a 3.5 pound piece of meat, so 9 and a half hours.  It got to an internal temperature of 175 before it started to rain and I said to heck with it and FTC'd it.  Then I made bbq sauce out of the apple juice and drippings and then following WTS's bbq sauce recipe.  The only problem WTS is that your bbq sauce recipe makes a heck of a lot of sauce (i.e. I laughed when I saw one bottle of ketchup as one of the ingredients), so I just fooled around, mixing in a little here and there and tasting all the way along.  It worked out really well.  That's a fantastic and delicious way to make BBQ sauce.



And there's the finished product.  It was amazing.  Even better than I expected.  The smokiness, the rub, the flavour of the beef.  If you've never made this, I recommend making it your next project.  Both my wife and mother in law loved it too and they've both been burned by more than one of my frequent Sunday experiments.







Last a question about brisket.  What is cutting against the grain?  Have I done it here or have I done it Bass Ackwards.

Thanks for all the help and ideas WTS.  Couldn't have made this without your post.

Carter

[Gizmo]

It looks like a flat from the picture.  I say this because of the fairly uniform thickness across the entire piece. 

In the fourth picture, you can see the grain of the meat running from the upper left corner to the lower right.  It looks like you cut across the short side of the meat which would make the cut to be somewhat diagonal but in essence you are good across the grain.  If you want to further enhance the tenderness with the cut, you can cut on a bias or in other words, at an angle.  This not only makes the fibers shorter (therefore makes it seem more tender) but it also makes the slice have a larger surface area.  I try to cut at a 45 deg angle to the cutting board.

[Carter]

Good advice.  Thanks Giz.

[Habanero Smoker]

Hi Carter;

Thanks for posting this. The finished product looks real good.

I've never seen a brisket cut in that manner. It looks like half of it is part of the flat, and the other half is part of the point. With flats you don't get that much of the fat vein, may just a little of the edge of the vein;  and they are not generally square shape. Flats generally taper to a point. When I first started selecting brisket I thought the flat was the point, because it was tapered. :-[ It may be what they call the center cut.

For me it is difficult to tell, but it looks like you cut with the grain. Was it a little tough. I cut my brisket a little thinner.

[westexasmoker]

Carter
Congrats on your brisket!  I think Giz and Habs have got ya pretty well covered!  Sorry I forgot to mention about the sauce...yeah it does make alot, save the empty ketchup bottle and fill it up with your leftover sauce and pop into the fridge for the next project!

C

[bflosmoke]

Hi Carter
Do you have a BJs club up there. The ones around Buffalo and the rest of NY seem to carry whole brisket. Maybe they do around TO to.
BFLO

[Tenpoint5]

The only thing I think could possibly make that any better would be HICKORY instead of tha nasty ol mesquite. LOL
Looks PDG there Carter. I hear ya on the sunday experimenting.

[Carter]

Thanks for the comments:

To answer Habs questions:  Was it a little tough.  Above the fat:  no, Below the fat yes a little.  I've got nothing to compare it to though so for me it was amazing.

And to answer BFLO's question - I don't think we do have a BJ's club up here.  At least I havent' seen one.  On another note, watched a great show on WNED last night (PBS in Buffalo that we get in Toronto).  Billy Joel live at the BBC doing The Stranger album in 1978.  I'd put that down as one of the all time great albums and to see it performed live was truly an unexpected treat for a regular Wednesday night.  Awesome!!  Of course we had to put up with the usual frequent PBS fundraising breaks, but last night it was worth it.

Carter

[hillbillysmoker]

Looks good Carter. Awesome pictures also. Thanks for sharing.