Pit temp...207... brisket temp 124.....come on, stop climbing so fast......else I am going to have brisket for breakfast. (Which, arguably, is not a terrible thing!)
I want to sleep, but my Grilla app has already failed; it no longer reads the temps. My Smoke is all I got.... (Always have redundant temp probes on a long cook!)
It hit 203 F and I probed it in several places. Decently probe tender, although less so near the end of the flat. Temped anywhere from 198 to 203 F. It is now resting in a cooler for at least the next three hours.
Well, it has been a few hours and I've reflected on my experience. It is weird that cooking a brisket intimidated me for so long. In hindsight, this wasn't difficult at all.
The keys to my success were good meat, the right equipment, and not overthinking it.
Good meat was the easy part as I am lucky to live where high-quality prime briskets are readily available. The right equipment refers, of course, to my Chimp pellet grill, but also in knowing myself. Even if I had an offset, I'm just not the type of person who enjoys staying up all right tending a fire.
And the not overthinking it is key. I did a lot of research and video watching to prepare for this. And some of those videos can get really, really intricate. I made sure to stick to the ones that would let me have a nice simple baseline for my first brisket cook.
So, am I going to do another brisket? Absolutely! And here is what I will do differently next time:
Trim just a bit more than I did this time, especially on that vein of fat between the point and the flat.
Try a more traditional rub (newspaper rub: salt, pepper, and red pepper flakes). I liked the Holy Cow, but i want to try the newspaper rub.
Not worry about the stall. At 195 F cooking temp, the brisket is in no danger of overcooking overnight it seems!
Consider resting for two rather than three hours. (The point side was still crazy hot, but the flat, while still hot, cooled more than I would have liked.)
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