Short Cook Beef Brisket!

So this is looking like a recurring theme here... It's UPDATE MONDAY! I guess I'm just always so excited about my weekend exploits that I like to experience it all over again in my head on Mondays. Well, this weekend I was really hoping the terrible weather forecast wouldn't prevent me from smoking the brisket I'd been thawing. A little background, I found the brisket in my mom's 2nd freezer and it was from a cow she bought with her friend that was "organic grass fed". So needless to say I was pretty excited about it and to be honest, there wasn't any weather that was going to stop me from cooking it. The original plan was to cook on Saturday but who was I kidding, I always do my BBQing on Sunday and why should this week be any different? I ended up kinda sleeping in anyways and Jenny was in town for one of her best friend's birthdays (girls weekend...lame I know) and I ended up meeting up with them for lunch near Downtown San Diego in Little Italy. So Saturday was out of the question. Sunday, as I should have known, worked out to be a much better day and it was clear and beautiful out on top of it.

So as any good BBQ goes it starts with a beer. This time I went with a Sierra Nevada. One thing I should just mention is that there is always beer in the fridge at my house. It doesn't seem like we even buy beer very often either. People that come over for BBQ's just tend to bring beer and we end up with lots leftover. That and I seem to always be doing favors for people that like to pay in cases of beer. Fine with me!

Ok, I just realized I've been rambling...Let's get to the meat of this thing! I picked the "Short Cook Beef Brisket" recipe from the BBQ book Jenny got me (the gift that keeps on giving). Again, a lot of the same basic ingredients as the ribs but with a few variations. I've either gotten lazy with measuring out ingredients or I just feel more confident with the portions now but this time I definitely misread teaspoon and tablespoon for the cayenne pepper...oops! The basic recipe was mustard, chili powder, and water for the wet rub and garlic salt, black pepper, lemon pepper, cayenne pepper, and chili powder for the dry rub. It also called for pieces of fresh garlic to be stuffed into little slots cut into the meat. I had some left over garlic so I sliced it and placed them on top just for the hell of it. The cook time was relatively short at 2.5 hours at 325 degrees but I can't seem to get my smoker to get higher than 250-275 so I just put it on high and let it go. When I opened it up 2.5 hours later it looked beautiful. Nice and golden brown with the "burnt" tips (the heavily smoked tips are my favorite). The final step, which I'm becoming quite fond of, is the wrapping. I took the meat out and wrapped it with tin foil after drizzling a mixture of brown sugar, honey, and water over it. Then I placed the wrapped brisket back into the smoker for 45 minutes. After taking out the brisket it is always extremely tempting to just dive right in but I swear to you that you'll get even better results if you wait about 20 minutes and let the meat "rest". It just turns out juicier that way...and here is the result!

Smoked Beef Brisket

Closing Comments
Overall I was very pleased with how this brisket turned out. It had a great tender texture with a crispy crust and was very juicy. I especially liked the little garlic pieces. This brisket definitely had a kick to it which I liked to a point but I think I will pay attention to the seasoning portions a little better next time and cut back a little on the cayenne pepper and chili powder. I also want to try this without the wrapping method because it already looks REALLY good before the wrapping and I'm just curious how it tastes. I'd guess a little less sweet without the honey and brown sugar. That's what I really love about BBQ though, you can do whatever you want and tweak it to your liking and it's pretty forgiving. As long as you're not going overboard on any one ingredient, adding random spices, or over/under cooking the meat, it's hard to go wrong. I guess that's the  hard part though...oh well, I seem to have a knack for it so I'm just not going to worry about that :)