A friend of mine made some deli style pastrami in his smoker so tonight I am trying it in the CS. I shortcut the process by purchasing a precured corned beef brisket. The recipe came from here: http://www.virtualweberbullet.com/pastrami.html

Just checked it and it looks great. The rub is very flavorful for being relatively simple.

Let us know how it goes. Good luck.

Turned out excellent. The rub was great and the flavor unbelieveable.

On Saturday, I plan on doing the Deli style brisket recipe from the Smoke & Spice book. It calls for trimmed flats that are brined overnight, rubbed with fresh cracked pepper, coriander seed, garlic, salt and mustard seed. Then smoked for 3 hours, foiled and continued in the smoker for another hour and a half or so. I have done the corned beef as pastrami - tastes pretty good but always find it a little too salty. I guess I am too anxious to get it smoking that I don't rinse it long enough.

Hey Dave, 4.5 hours don't sound like near long enough to me for a brisket. Maybe if it is really small. You should pick a target temp, use a temp probe, and go with that.

Hippie - the recipe is for a four pound, fully trimmed brisket flat. I have done untrimmed flats (7-8 lbs) and they have taken between 7 and 10 hours so I too am anxious to see if the smaller trimmed brisket and foiling results in a fully cooked brisket. Note also that it is to make a deli style brisket, not the brisket that you or I would normally make. When I made one from corned beef, it cooked in much less time than the untrimmed flats also, taking about five hours to come to 190 degrees.

Local market had trimmed flats on sale for 2.29 lb. Bought four (abt 4.5 lbs. each) and tomorrow I will do tow of them with that Smoke & Spice deli brisket recipe.

I did a 3.5 pound corned beef brisket recently (St. Pat's Day special). It took eight hours at 225 degrees to reach 190 internal. It was tasty, but I found it to have a lot more internal fat than the flat from my last brisket.
I will admit, I am a little finicky when the fat is cold and white, I tend to slice around it. Should I go to a higher temperature to squeeze out a little more of the fat, or is this a result from the corning process?

Enquiring minds want some que.

twofer - my guess is that you just had a fatty brisket and nothing else. Your internal temp of 190F seems way high for pastrami. When I do pastrami , my target internal temp is 165F. Also, keep in mind that a corned brisket, whether it's already corned or you corn it yourself, is going to cook faster than an untreated brisket.

Thanks for the reply; that seems to be the local consensus that it was just a fatty cut. My favorite deli does a pastrami rueben that I love, but the meat just looks so much better hot and glistening on their sandwich than it does cold from my fridge. I guess I will dial it back some next time and hope for some better meat.

OK - I followed the Smoke & Spice recipe for "deli style brisket" to a T and what I got was a very tasty but somewhat dry brisket. First - the meat was not cured, only brined so that the inside looked just like brisket, not like corned beef or pastrami. Second, the spice rub was terrific. Third, the meat was so lean (almost 5lb trimmed flats) that after cooking for three hours at 220 and two hours foiled at the same temp, it was too dry. I should have save the juices from the foil pan, separated the fat, and poured the juices back over the sliced brisket. I will make the recipe again, but next time will foil sooner and pull sooner. But when I served it piled high on rye and pumpernickle bread with mustard, horseradish and sliced Vidalia oinion, there were no complaints from the family.

"But when I served it piled high on rye and pumpernickle bread with mustard, horseradish and sliced Vidalia oinion, there were no complaints from the family."

That is what I love about this forum, we are our own harshest critics. If pretty good was good enough, we wouldn't bother to come around. 'No complaints' definitely does not cut it; "don't compliment me on these ribs because I understand how they could have been better, and I will by gosh make them so." I love the stress of trying to make my easily satisfied eaters demand more of me. "You will get perfect barbecue from me, whether you want it or not, muuhahahaha!!"

Sorry, I got lost in the moment. Back to your regularly scheduled programming.