Brisket driving me crazy

[Big Steve]

Here's the deal. 3 briskets in our RFS yesterday. They hit the rack at 5:30 AM. Cook chamber temp held steadish around 225 (ok, I had mild swings but nothing crazy). Briskets were packers, we did minor fat trimming, left 1/4 min. Rubbed with a basic 50/50 Salt Pepper with spices. Charcoal for heat, Oak for smoke. No foil or wrapping. No basting spritzing or mopping, no water pan. Internal temp hit 200 around 2:30 PM. Pulled them off, separated the point for burnt ends. Burnt ends were given a dash of sweet rub, and a splash of BBQ, a little water into the pan and back in to the smoker they went for 1 hour. The flats were wrapped tightly and taken home for dinner. The good news is the Burnt Ends were awesome. The flat was cut 1/4" thick and was dry. No moisture in the flat at all. Nice looking smoke ring, nice bark, beef flavor but was dry.
Tips welcome please: We're plan on entering a KCBS local comp in June. Next one will be injected, rubbed more, spritzed. Aside from that what tips do you have for moist brisket flats?

[The Czar]

Injection… Injection… Injection


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[Gizmo]

What DC said... What DC said... What DC said

[Clover Ridge Smokers]

Yep you missed the injection. You can also try wrapping during the last part of the cook. Texas crutch.

[Big Steve]

Yep, will do next time. We've all seen the Franklin Brisket youtube videos I'm assuming. He doesn't inject, he keeps it simple with salt/pepper only and smoke over oak. He said he prefers to not wrap, but in the video he does. So what's the deal, surely it's possible to get a moist brisket without injecting isn't it?
Don't get me wrong I have not "elite purist" rules about not injecting or wrapping, I'm simply just trying to make it all make sense.

[Gizmo]

Wrapping helps a great deal to reduce the total time required to cook a brisket, a butt too for that matter. If you bring the core temp up to around 150F then you've let darn near all the smoke get at that meat that it will absorb - no sacrifice in flavor at that point and it's also about where the "stall" starts anyway. Many people will then remove it at around 175F and finish it on the grate. Don't get me wrong - not wrapping is fine - but I have a day job so my weekends are only 2 days long…...

So when I want to eat brisket the same weekend I cooked it - I wrap it. Otherwise it seems to finish up in the middle of next week.

[Big Steve]

[SoloQue]

Everything I have read pretty much agrees that after 140 your smoke ring is finished. I'd say for the purposes of moisture go for the wrap for 145 - 185 then unwrap for last hour or so to set the bark. No brisket artist here but thats my thought.

[Pete Mazz]

Best part of wrapping, besides saving time, is having those juices to add back after slicing. Forget spritzing as it just adds time to your cook. That little bit of liquid never reaches into the meat to make a difference. Maybe try a better cut of meat? I bought Angus last time for just a little bit more and it was worth it. Never tried the fancy Wagu or such. If I was serious about a comp I might consider it. Can't make bacon out of a pigs ear....

[Big Steve]

Lesson learned. What lesson you ask? The one where you Dad say's "you get what you paid for" or the one where Grandpa says's "do it right the first time and you won't have to fix it a second time". So after buying two small cheapie thermometers and doing about 5 cooks we realized that the one relied on was reading low by 30 degrees. So I thought I over cooking everything which explains the quick cook times, burn rate of charcoal and wood and dryness of some cuts of meat.

Today I order the Tru-tell from smokebuilders.

As for today's cook we did up 1 brisket (injected and rubbed), 2 pork butts (rubbed only) and 2 St Louis Spares. The cook went faster than planned but thanks to my new themopen thermometer I wrapped it at my target temps, pulled from smoker at 198 on the brisket for example and stuffed it into a cooler (backyard cambro) for holding. All three meat came out great. The brisket flat was a lot moister, a 1/4" thick flat cross grain slice pulled apart well, it had nice smoke on it and nice flavor. Nothing from the injection overpowered the meat. Injection was beef broth, water, worchestershire sauce, onion and garlic powder.
The point was super moist and crazy good without adding more sweet rub or sauce and making burnt end.
It's been a good day of BBQ. Happy, fully stoked on the smoke.

[Pete Mazz]

Cool beans!!! Nothing beats good bbq, cooking or eating.

[Rodcrafter]

That's great, glad you got it figured out.

[Puff]

One of those stories with a happy ending....

[alleyrat58]

If you really don't want to wrap it you're going to need a good mop with some olive oil in it. If you're going to go that route, get yourself a bunch of the good stringy mop brushes and mop those briskets like crazy. Invest in prime beef also to get the fat you're looking for and then stop trimming them. It is definitely harder to do but it can be done without foil.

Me? I'm lazy and I like foil.

[Rev.Mike]

i must be an odd ball here, i use either butcher paper or an old brown paper bag to wrap, just something that i was taught years ago, may have to try foil next time