More chuck

[DaveD]

Coincidentally to Oak Smoke's thread this morning, I'm trying to perfect my chuck approach, so that they can be reliably excellent as most seem to attain, rather than the hit-or-miss I've had for a while now, maybe half of them have been really good and the rest, not so much.

So it'll be maximum verbosity to capture how I proceed, and of course input is always welcome, wherever it may fall on the scale between substance and snark

My approach has always been very traditional. Low and slow at around 225/110, target an IT of 200/93 to 205/96, probe for tenderness as the final determiner of when to pull it. Rest times have not typically exceeded an hour, because they usually take a solid 8 hours, sometimes closer to 10, and we start getting hangry...

I also have taken to using the foil boat on these, and still am at that half good, half not ratio since starting to boat. Today I'm going to watch temp like a hawk and keep it as close to 225/110 as I can, and I do plan to boat this puppy.

Starting material is a 3.1lb/1.4kg Choice chuckster from our local Wegmans. Nice looking slab o'beef. Dry brined it overnight as usual.


Half an hour prior to going on, hit it with Spiceology Cowboy Crust, part of my haul from my Secret Santa last December that has become our absolute go-to for any slow cooked beef. We love this stuff!


Got it on the grate a little before 9am, and all is nominal.

90 minutes in.


And it looks to be entering at least the outskirts of Stallsville, if it isn't downtown already...

More later...!

[Jfrosty27]

I’ve only done a few chuckies myself but my results, like yours, have been hit or miss. About 50/50 for me. So…watching with interest. Especially the advice to come.

[Michael_in_TX]

I agree with you and Oak Smoke there is a surprising learning curve to chuck roasts. For me the two stumbling blocks were final temp and wrapping.

For the first few chuck roasts I did, I just did not take them high enough. I got fixated on that "magic" 203 F and even though they were probe tender, they did not pull. When I finally got them to 207-210 F, I started getting the pulling I wanted.

Relatedly, I had to get over my aversion to wrapping. Ribs, pork butt....those cook near-perfectly in my PBC without wrapping, but chuck roasts for whatever reason do not. I think it is simply I'm buying roasts that are not as marbled as they should be, so they dry out.

When I started wrapping/braising, it changed everything. While the bark on the bottom softens more than I'd like, I still have all the bark on the top and at the end of the day, if you're doing pulled meat and mixing it all up....that bark is going to soften anyway.

As always, really enjoy your detailed cook threads.

[DaveD]

That is one thing I have not done: go to that higher temp. I might just give that a try today depending on how things look.

[fzxdoc]

This.

[DaveD]

Cruising right along and definitely stalling spectacularly. No surprise, check out all the pools of liquid on the quite flat top surface of the cut. Its slab-like form is going to give a platform for liquid to collect on so this stall could go for a while...




That fat seam has turned into a Valley Of Juice, a veritable Valles Marineris of rendering fat...

[Michael_in_TX]

Now I'm never going to be able to look at a chuck roast as anything other than the surface of Mars now. (But, you're right....it does really look like that on yours!)

Random Trivia for those not all that versed on the geography of Mars: Valles Marineris is the only 'canal' of Mars that corresponds to anything real.

[DaveD]

Michael_in_TX Later on when everything's in shade again, it'll be much more visible in the photos, that half-sunshine shot has crap exposure... and yeah, VM is the granddaddy of all canyons in the entire solar system, pretty much. I've got some size comparison graphics I'll drop in below.

[Jerod Broussard]

I typically wrap in the 190's, take to 208-ish, hold in a 195-200 oven for an hour or two, then a bit more of a warm hold either in a warming oven at 145 or wrapped in a cooler/cambro.

[Jared49]

What is your “wrap”, foil or butcher paper??

[Jerod Broussard]

Jared49 foil. Quit using butcher paper almost a decade ago.

[fzxdoc]

This.

[DaveD]

As Michael_in_TX mentioned, Valles Marineris is the only real "canal" on Mars, discernible with good telescopes from Earth. It is the largest canyon system in the solar system, and it's hard to grasp just how big it is. I mean really, really big.

Compared to the United States:


Cross-section comparison with the Grand Canyon:


And all this happens on a planet that is about one-third the size of our Earth. Go figure.

[DaveD]

OK, fun's fun, but the temp started to actually decrease, so I've kicked it up a notch, aiming for 250/120ish, and might let it go higher if need be to get things turned around. Clearly evaporation from Valles Marineris is removing heat faster than the cut is taking it up at 225/107. More power Mister Sulu!

[Michael_in_TX]

We need to decrease the atmospheric pressure so liquid water can't exist! (Okay, perhaps I am pushing the Mars metaphor at bit too hard now lol...)

[DaveD]

Increasing the kettle temp did get things moving again, and now at 6.5 hours in, I put the chuck into the foil boat. It felt pretty tender in the few brief moments I had it in my gloved hands putting it onto the boat. Also rotated it 180 degrees just in case. (Some may recall an experiment I did in this kettle with six temp probes, showing quite uniform temp distribution on the indirect side.)

Valles Marineris not quite so pronounced now that evap can't keep up with heat uptake anymore.


I poked at the fuel to even out the as-yet-unlit coals and shift that chunk of wood closer to the burning zone, which gave it time to catch fire while I was battening down the hatches. Bonus flame!


That boost of energy gave a temp spike, requiring some vent adjustments, and as usual, internal temps dipped at first but soon start to recover and increase at a not hugely but noticeably steeper rate. So far, this cut is cooking as I'm expecting.


Meanwhile, in the kitchen, my lovely bride is making her to-die-for browned butter chocolate chip cookies for dessert. I am a lucky man.


And this pan is going in the freezer for posterity...


Finally, it is an absolutely GORGEOUS day, a week before solstice, just a few high clouds in very light breezes at 84/29 and a dew point of 56/13, so it feels wonderful, not at all humid.



For today, right now, life is good

[Michael_in_TX]

And that deck turned out really nice.

[Sid P]

You picked the right day to cook out, Dave. That’s a nice dry day for VA in June.

[fzxdoc]

I really like that first photo. It shows your new deck to such a great advantage.

K.

[DaveD]

The cut reached 208-210/98-99, probing very tender, so I've transferred it into the (recently cleaned!) Pit Boss pellet rig with the set point at 150/65 to hold for the next couple of hours - we want to eat at 7pm, two hours from now. Fingers crossed, everything seems totally nominal thus far, no surprises... transferred fifteen minutes ago and temps already down to about 198/92.



Next up will be after-action... wish me luck from the gods of Chuck!

[Jerod Broussard]

She gonna be goooooood!!

[Michael_in_TX]

That bark is nothing less than majestic!

[Jared49]

Sure hope it turns out, as good as it looks, it would be disappointing if it didn’t!!

[DaveD]

OK, deliverables! Holy bovine, Batman! This was the best chuck roast I've ever made. Every bit as good as it looks. Super tender, pulled easily, juicy as all getout, and the bark was off the hook. The one thing I have not done before is go to those higher finishing ITs, so I will do the same next time and see if this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship...

The roast ended up holding in the Pit Boss for just about exactly two hours with the cooker oscillating between 150/65 and 175/80, during which time the ITs drifted down to about 165/74. Lots of juices in the bottom of the boat.




Poured all that on top and hit it with the bear claws.




Plated with steamed broccoli and a bowl of Rancho Gordo pinto beans that I had left from my last pot of chilibeans a few weeks back. Those beans were fan freakin tastic too. All in all a top notch meal.



And for dessert, the cookies! My lovely bride included bonus butterscotch chips as well as the dark chocolate ones. She usually puts toffee chips in, but was out of those today.

[Jared49]

That’s an amazing cook!!

[fzxdoc]

Back in the day when I first took a chuckie up to 207-209° instead of pulling it at 203° (on the advice of the then Pit Boss, Dave Parrish) for the cambro hold, it was such a HUGE game changer. I've been indebted to Dave ever since for that.

Sounds like you just had a similar experience. Congrats.

Kathryn

[DaveD]

And it is an eminently testable hypothesis! More data are clearly needed

[DaveD]

Thanks for the moral support folks - in looking at my notes of prior chuck cooks, it seems that not only is the higher IT a first, but a full two hours of (sorta) holding in the 150/65 to 175/80 range is longer than I'd managed to hold/rest before as well.

To be sure, I'll do another chuck here sooner than later and repeat these additions and see if I get a similar result.