Max Capacity Cook Impact?

[JPGators17]

Summary: First cook with a full (big) smoker, resulted in longest brisket cook ever and worst bark ever.

Details:

Cooker: Stump's Classic (big cabinet)

Cook:
2 14lbs briskets, Costco Prime (pre-trim)
3 pork butts (approx 9lbs, 11lbs, 13lbs
4 Turkey thighs (BIG ones)
Pork belly (cubed for burnt ends)

Everything was cooked in aluminum pans, which take up more space, so the smoker was filled to capacity. I set my probes on the top, middle and bottom racks and with the help of my guru, the temps were consistently at or near 250 degrees throughout the cook.

I put the brisket and butts on at 7PM, Friday, the turkey thighs and pork belly went on earlier and got pulled by around 8:30.

I waited, and waited, and waited, for the brisket and butts to hit the stall or at least have the bark set enough for me to wrap and get to bed. At about 3:30AM (the butt was at 160, and the brisket at 148), I gave up and wrapped them even though the bark was still like wet paste on both.

I got a few hours of sleep, and at 7:45AM, the butts were passing 200, but the brisket was only at 149 (1 degree higher than when I wrapped it 4 hours earlier). At this point I knew I was officially going to be late to my own tailgate. I pulled the butts and coolered them.

Now the brisket was all alone, so I gave it another hour and it climbed to 158. I decided to bump the temp to 300. It started climbing, but two more hours passed and it was only at 184. I was severely late at this point and upped the temp to 325.

At 12:17PM () I had to pull it, regardless of the results. It was at 200. I threw them in a cooler and headed out. The bark was still a pasty mush when I sliced it a couple of hours later, but it had nice flavor and decent tenderness. Everyone loved it, (except me of course). Poor souls have just been deprived of decent brisket, i guess.

So it took 17.5 hours for the briskets to be almost done, but two weeks prior I did a single brisket of similar size in the same cooker and it took less than 12 hours. My only thought is that the cooker having so much meat in it created more moisture, and even though the chamber temp was a steady 250, there must have been a super stall effect somehow.

Is there anything I can do to overcome this? My only thought is to cook at 275-300, but not sure that's the right answer.

[Troutman]

I realize they catch a lot of that fatty juice, but to my way of thinking and cooking, ditch the foil pans. Let that hot, moist air circulate around the meat to develop that bark. That's the first thing I see that may help in the future.

[CaptainMike]

My first thought as well.

[JPGators17]

Neither the briskets nor the butts were sitting on the bottom of the pans, they were elevated on racks.

[jfmorris]

JPGators17 think about it though - even on a rack to keep them off the bottom of the pan, that pan blocks a ton of airflow around the meat.

[CaptainMike]

I'm with Troutman, let 'em ride without the pans. I do those big clods at 275 with no problems.

[holehogg]

Not sure this is of any relevance but I use a vertical / cabinet gasser that has 10 racks.
I mostly use the top three racks as it has enough space for most of my cooks. When I do chicken pieces and use foil on the grates I fold up the ends to catch the juices. I leave about a 4 inch gap on either side for airflow with very limited gap from front to back.. I have observed that the centre rack of the 3 always seems to take the longest to finish cooking. The bottom rack next and top rack is ready first. If I don't use any foil they are done more or less at the same time.
My reasoning is the flow of air is more restricted around the centre rack. The bottom rack is getting the heat rising from the bottom and obviously the top rack is where the heat is gathering before exiting the chimney.
I think even though the meat was raised in your pans the flow was still restricted and even more so because of the amount of pans in the cooker.
What rack was your brisket on to start with?

This is an obeservation of my cooker and just an assumption of why the finishing times differ when I use foil opposed to not using it.

[JPGators17]

I had the briskets on the top two racks, but I think what you're saying makes sense. While the meat was raised inside the pans, the pans themselves were probably hindering the all around airflow of the cook chamber.

[holehogg]

That's the logical conclusion I've come to in mine but I may be mistaken.

[jfmorris]

I'm with the rest of the gang, and feel that the foil pans are part of your problem. Those block airflow, especially if the cooker was crammed full of them. Reduced airflow across the meat leads to mushy or poor bark.

I never cook in foil pans - I know many do, as it leaves less mess in the cooker, but the few times I tried it, the bottom of the meat that was cooked that way had absolutely zero bark, plus the butt sat in its own juices, so it just made the bottom 1/3 of the butt a big soggy mess in my opinion. I like bark, so cooking on the grate, with air flow all around, is the way I go these days.

I do crutch my briskets once they hit the 160-170 range and have good bark, but even then, find my typical brisket to take 14 to 16 hours. It varies by piece of meat, grade of beef, and a lot of other factors.

I've crammed my small offset full with as many as 8 butts before, and bark never suffered, and time really did not increase for the cook, as long as there was air gap between the butts, so that air flow occurred all around each piece of meat. I also have to rotate things during the cook from one end to the other, due to a temperature gradient across the smoker, but that would be the case even with fewer items. I might have used more fuel to maintain the temperature with a full load, but other than that, the cook was not impacted.

So - ditch the pans. The at was likely the culprit that lead to both the increased cooking time, and the bad bark.

[mountainsmoker]

Aluminum is a great insulator. Get rid of the pans. You obviously had room on your Traeger for all your meat with out them.

[Red Man]

Aluminum is actually a great conductor...a pan is a great airflow blocker, which is the problem in this case.

[texastweeter]

tried it before on 2 cooks of 10+ briskets. The pans are what is killing your bark.

[frigate]

In my short time in BBQ, I started with pans for clean up. Had the problems talked about above. Went to different size baking pans with racks. The baking pans and racks let the air get to the meat and led to a positive step in my BBQ journey. Foiled the pans and put the racks in the dishwasher for quick clean up.