Water yer thoughts...?

[ecully]

Doing a brisket tonight on my RT smoker and was wondering if there is a consensus on whether to have a pan of water next to the HOF. Will crutch/wrap (crap?) at the appropriate temp, if that makes any difference. So, any opinions? Thanks!

[Powersmoke_80]

Don't think its necessary on the pellet grill I never have.

[ecully]

Yup -- that's the way I'm going to go. Thanks for your help.

[ecully]

Put the brisket on about midnight, checked this morning at 9:00 -- 160 degrees. Turned it over, and the temp has actually dropped. Haven't seen that before (on pork butt). Will crutch now, but curious if this is unusual.

[Jerod Broussard]

Were you running fat cap up, then flipped to fat cap down?

[ecully]

Exactly. Once I crutched it, it moved up to 203 without any issues. I'll post some pix.

[DWCowles]

I never use water pan in the RT or the stickburner

[ecully]

Here are some pix of the brisket. Taste was great, but always looking to improve.

[Jerod Broussard]

Man those smoke rings on pellet cookers look as though they are spray painted on.

[Jerod Broussard]

ecully

About the flipping up top. I contacted Dr. Blonder a couple weeks ago about why the top of the flat is the very last thing to bark up on a brisket. I was wondering if maybe it had a higher moisture content being more lean than the point. I wondered that because moisture inhibits bark formation. He said he would do some testing when the snow goes away.

My theory is that by flipping over, it allowed more efficient evaporative cooling on the surface of the flat, thus reducing the temp of the brisket.

I have ALWAYS flipped my briskets from fat cap up to fat cap down to get the top of the flat barked up when cooking indirectly.

I never take temps until I wrap, and that is just to know how far I am from 200.

[ecully]

Sounds like a good theory; it's certainly logical. After decreasing 4 degrees, it probably took 30 minutes to increase a couple degrees. That's when I crutched. Many thanks for your input!