Weekday Brisket

Through my years of teaching BBQ I have found that most students that I teach a brisket lesson to are are planning to smoke brisket on the weekends. However, many people want to enjoy brisket during the week and wonder how can you do that if you can't run a fire all day while you have to work. In this video and recipe we show you how to make what we call the Weekday Brisket!

Meat Church How To YouTube Video: https://youtu.be/PFL7tTmvVBU
All Brisket Videos: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLLlcC6gl4PGL-ZU6o3AAiVKt5d50n4HzL

Ingredients

• 1 15 - 18 lb full packer brisket, trimmed
• 2 T, Meat Church Holy Cow (sub salt & pepper)
• 1 T, yellow mustard for a binder 

Tools

• Instant Read Thermometer
• butcher paper, unwaxed
• Spray Bottle with Apple Cider Vinegar

Prepare the Pellet Grill\Smoker
Prepare your pellet grill to a temperature of 200 with oak, mesquite, hickory or pecan. In this video we used a Traeger Ironwood XL with Meat Church pellets which is a blend of oak and hickory. 

Prepare the Brisket
We are staring with a trimmed brisket. You can see my trimming method to maximize perfect slices in this How to Trim a Brisket video. Never waste any trim. Grind your trim into ground meat for burgers etc.

Slather your brisket all over with mustard. This will act as a binder and assist your seasoning in sticking all over throughout the cook. Immediately season the brisket to your liking. In this video we seasoned simply with our Holy Cow which is salt, pepper & garlic, so it is a very traditional Texas brisket flavor profile.

Allow the seasoning to adhere at least 30 minutes. For best results allow the seasoning to adhere overnight in your refrigerator.

Smoke the Brisket
Place the brisket fat side up in the pellet grill. If you have a 2nd shelf that is large enough to hold a brisket I prefer to place it there to get the brisket a little further away from the heat source that is directly in the middle.

A lot of folks prefer smoking meat side up. If that is your preference that is ok. Again, we are going the more traditional Texas fat side up method in this video which yields my favorite results.

Smoke the brisket until you reach an internal temp of 175. That took 13 hours in this video. 

Wrap the Brisket
Wrap the brisket in butcher paper. Butcher paper is permeable which helps you keep that bark you have developed so far. If you prefer, you can wrap in foil. This method will steam the brisket, finishing cooking a little quicker and the bark can become wet. The difference in wrapping in paper vs. foil can be seen in this following Smoking Brisket in Foil vs. Butcher Paper video.

At this point you need to decide how quickly, or far out, you want to eat your brisket. That will determine how much you increase the temperature to "finish" the brisket. If you want to elongate the cook as long as possible you can slightly increase the temperature to 225 and gradually increase throughout the day as you wish to finish the brisket. In this video we went from 200 to 275 so we could finish in 2 - 3 hours.

Smoke until tender in the middle of the flat which was 203 in this video.

Rest the Brisket
The rest is just as important as the cook. The top BBQ joints in Texas rest their briskets for 8 hours in a warmer at 140. Most home cooks don't have that options as they lack the required tools to safely maintain a brisket above 140 internal temperature. A brisket will not safely hold in a cooler that long. An option is to rest the brisket for 2 hours at ambient temperature on the counter. Then place the brisket into your Traeger on "Keep Warm" which is 165 on a Traeger. That is a little hotter than the ideal temperature so play with that to your liking. Another option is your oven, but they typically only go down to 170 degrees.

In this video we rested at ambient temperature on the counter in our outdoor kitchen until the internal temperature was 140 degrees. 

Slice the Brisket
Unwrap, pour any residual tallow from the butcher paper on the brisket. Slice only what you want to eat and enjoy!