HELP!! 1st brisket - what temp or texture to look for to remove the point for burnt ends?

BigWader

Okay - Saturday night - 11:30 pm.  Got my first brisket onto the egg about 1 hr ago.  It's a rough start - raining and 7 degrees celcius outside.  Egg against the back of the garage and I've got a makeshift patio umbrella so I can stand in a somewhat dry spot.  When I thought the egg was stable about 260 dome I put the brisket on - but it seems I choked the fire too much since after 30 minutes the grate temp was 170 and starting to drop.  Got the fire stoking again and climbing toward 275 dome (hoping for 250 grate).

Brisket is a 10lb'er that I trimmed fat from rubbed with Plowboys Bovine Bold and is sitting over a pan with a bit of beer, onion, and apple juice.

Anyway - assuming the temps don't keep me up all night what temp or texture do you recommend removing the point for burnt ends?

At this rate I'm thinking dinner tomorrow will be a late one (probably going to foil it through the plateau to cut some time - unless the wisdom of the board recommends otherwise.

Thanks,

nolaegghead

The brisket could be causing your grate probe to read low. 

When you throw it on, it's like throwing a big ice cube in a glass of tap water.  There's more of a load so the temp will drop.

Open slightly (very slightly) your controls and give it an hour to stabilize.  Don't be tempted to chase the temp. 

It's ok if you open it up a bit to get it to your set point, but put the controls back to where they were, a little more open to compensate for the load.

BigWader

Thanks Nola - at 12:15 now and the grate temp is 225.  I'm dialing it in and I feel like I've got a stable fire so I'm going to try and get in the 240-250 grate temp zone. 

I know with my old offset adding a water pan made it hard to push the temps higher and this is the first time I've used a pan with added liquid on the egg.  It doesn't seem to be holding back the ability to go warmer.

 

nolaegghead

Cool. Sounds like you'll do fine.  To answer your other question - I've never done burnt ends.  I believe, although I'm not sure, you finish the brisket, leave the fire on, cut the ends from the point and throw them back on. I'm not sure same temp or higher.

Nature Boy

On the point, for burnt ends, the key is to render the heavy fat out. I shoot for a minimum of 205 internal. Happy brisketeering!

Chris

BigWader

So here's how the rest of the cook turned out.  Went to bed about 1:45 am and smoker was sitting around 245 grate.  I felt it wasn't stable so I set the thermometer to let me know if it went over 260. 

At about 6:00 am it started beeping and I was about 263 so I got up to bring it down a bit.  Didn't open the egg to peak (so hard not to) and went back to bed.  My daughter got us all up at 7:30 so I went and took a look and the temp was back in the 240's.

After breakfast we had to make an errand so I went to foil it but checked the temp and we were already at 170 so I decided to let it go without and find out what kind of result it would get. 

Back home 12:45 and check and holy we're already at 190+ in spots and the texture was soft - off to hold/seperate the point and make burnt ends.  Here's a couple pics.  At dinner my cell was dead so no sliced pics but I can tell you it was in my opinion too soft - I had to slice about 1/3 inch thick to keep the slices together without shredding.  Maybe a bit dry after it cooled

BigWader

This was the first time I used a pan with liquid below something I smoked.  Don't know if that sped up the cook - or if the 90 minutes of prepping the smoker with the brisket on the counter inside helped it come to temp faster.

Next time I would try and watch the final temps closer to pull it when temp/texture was a little earlier and let it finish in the foil.