Help with brisket please!

[bennyo]

Seasons greetings!

I ordered a brisket from my local butcher here in Australia last week. I picked it up this morning, along with a piece of pork.

When I got it home, I weighed it to be 2.33kg, or 5.1lb. Then I got it out of the bag, and found it to be about 26" long, and about 1" thick at best, in places, with others possibly half that. Looking at the brisket page on here, I think that it's a HOF.

My wife suggested that I roll it, but I know that in doing so I would miss out on lots of browning, and it wouldn't look very appetising by the time it is done. My plan is to cut it in half to fit it in my 22.5" Weber. I hope I have enough room with the 9lb pork! The smokenator will hopefully give me enough indirect cooking space.

Is this right? Is it too thin? I feel like cooking it for 12+ hours will be too much for what is a pretty thin cut of meat, but I'm happy to be proven wrong.

Any suggestions??

[Jerod Broussard]

Wow, looks more like a SOF (Slice of Flat) rather than a HOF.

We tend to indirect thicker cuts of meat. What is the actual thickness??

May be better off heating it with some pretty decent heat to darken it up some. Then panning it until it gets tender. That is what I am doing right now with a chuck roast, that is thicker, but darn good finishing up in the oven, covered with some onions and bell peppers.

[_John_]

Never seen that before. That would be hard to smoke like you said... If I had that I would smoke it for a few hours and then cube and do burnt ends with the whole thing, there should be enough moisture in the sauce to let you get it tender. I am not however a brisket expert, this is just what I would do. Not that anybody probably has much experience with a cut like that!

[bennyo]

I thought that it seemed too thin. The strange thing is though, it has the fat top and bottom so with my very limited brisket knowledge, I think that it is a whole flat, just a very slim one. It is 1" thick in parts. I will check out the burnt ends recipe, might be the best option, unless anyone has a better idea. I'm also going to get a new butcher.

[tomtel84]

I agree with Jerod in that you have yourself a brisket flat, no point attached. This is still a very good piece of meat, but you will need to treat it a little different. I like the idea of direct high heat to get the char, or reverse sear by running slow and the sear at the end. The problem with the reverse sear it may be hard to do with just one cooker.

This is a thinner cut so not as much fat and the marbling isn't as good as the point so burnt ends wouldn't be as good with this cut. Now that I've said this you can make burnt ends out of anything they are just better on the point.

Since this is thin it shouldn't take very long to cook so keep an eye on it and you may want to leave it in the cooler longer than two hours to let the connective tissue to break down real good.

I have cooked this before in my 22 Weber and it turned it out great. If the fat cap is gone make sure to use some type of barer between the coals and the meat once you have a char.

Keep us posted on the progress and take pix.

[Huskee]

I would treat a flat the same as a whole. Put a probe in it, smoke it at 225 or 250, either wrap it when you're into the stall or when your bark is how you want it and take it to the cherished 203 or so, then wrap and hold an hour or 3. It will get a good bark during the smoke, but a direct sear will help your bark too. It will still need low and slow to not be a tough piece of rubber. Brisket is chest pectoral muscle of the cow, tough stuff.

[tomtel84]

I agree, you need some low and slow at some point, it's just not going to take very long, but I don't know if the stall will really be obvious due to how thin. Wrap is a good idea with some liquid, and this may help with the lack of fat.

[Huskee]

Yeah it might not if it's abnormally thin, it may be a quick stall. I've done flats that had a definite stall, and I've done a full 16lb packer that had zero stall and was ready for the cambro at the 4hr mark cooked at 240! You just never know.

[David Parrish]

I agree with Huskee on this one... low and slow.

[bennyo]

Thanks for the helpful replies.

Any guesses on how long this might take to cook at 225?

I was thinking to myself that I could cut it in half, then sit the two halves on top of each other. Theoretically this should make it cook like a single piece. Then when it's up toward 203 I could separate them and get the bark going on the two sides that had been in the middle. Thoughts?

I had originally ordered a 6.5lb brisket and 6.5lb butt and expected to be able to cook them overnight at 225. Seems like it's going to take a bit more thinking than that

[bennyo]

Ok, I have a plan. Please tell me what you think. My hardware is a 22.5" Weber kettle, smokenator and auber 1615. We are serving Christmas lunch between 12 and 1pm. I will put the pork on tonight at 8pm, then go to bed. At 3am I will get up and put the beef on, cut in half, but separate. I may stay up from then, to keep a close eye on things. Estimating the cook time from the beef ribs recipe, I'm expecting to pull it off sometime between 8 and 10am. With any luck the pork will be at 203f around the same time. Then it's into the faux cambro for both. If worse comes to worse and the beef is ready too far ahead of time, i will wrap it and stick it in the oven at 175. Then I'll take it up to 325 and the turkey will go in. Thoughts? Any holes in my plan that you can see?

[Huskee]

Are you planning on a 7hr run from one load in the smokenator? Also I'm confused, are you cooking brisket or beef ribs?

[tomtel84]

Sounds like a good plan to me.....I'm looking forward to the report as to how this worked.

[bennyo]

Yeah the smokenator has had no issues with 8ish hours before at 225. I normally put in 45 unlit briquettes and 15 lit. This will be my first unattended cook, so I will put a few extra unlit in there this time. Sorry for the confusion, I am doing the brisket, but I based the estimated time on the 1" thick beef rib cook time, as thats the closest thing I could find. Im really in unknown territory with my slice of flat

[Huskee]

Gotcha. It's hard to say on the thin brisket flat, ribs have bones which behave differently than solid muscle. But as long as you're going to be attentive to it in case it varies from the game plan you should be able to adjust things to make it happen, should it be necessary to.

Please report back your findings, as this will help other members who search this type of thing!

[fracmeister]

If you don't normally inject, this might be the time to do so. I still think you want low and slow. You might just have to have some chopped sandwiches with the thinnest bits, but there is no eternal punishment reserved for that in my particular religious faith.

[bennyo]

Well, I am pleased to say that it actually turned out rather well. The beef was on from 4am until 11am when it hit 203f. It stalled around 140f for a couple of hours, and with the deadline approaching I wrapped it at 9am in the 150s. I also cranked the heat up from 225 to 275 to try to speed up the process. After that the internal temperature rose fairly steadily, but the last few degrees seemed to take forever. I put it in the faux cambro for a little over 2 hours and when it came out, it was still smoking hot.

It turned out delicious. My guests were very impressed. I can't wait to actually try out these techniques on a whole packer.

Thanks for the assistance along the way.

[Huskee]

Great! Good job. No pics?

[The Burn]

Forget the pics, I want samples

[bennyo]

Here's a quick shot of one of the pieces. I got a little caught up with breakfast etc and didn't use as much wood as I had intended to, so there wasn't much of a smoke ring. I am looking forward to doing a whole packer, if this is anything to go by it's a wonderful part of the cow