first big brisket

Cook it whole.

Put the probe in the flat.

LOTS of people like the eat the point when it comes off and it will slice fine, it's a little fattier. Others will pull the brisket, separate them, put the point back in for one hour, then slice that. Let it go one more hour for burnt ends.

Since it's your first for a whole brisket; cook it whole, take it out and separate them. Notice the grain runs different in the two pieces. Slice them both and enjoy.

Thanks!!

Should I load up on wood since this is going to be such a long smoke?

Lucky-

Don't load it up! If you don't believe me, read through all the 101's and earlier posts, but 3-4oz. is a good start, then vary the amount to taste on future cooks. You will be amazed at how much smoke flavor this will give you. Use a kitchen scale to see how little this really is, but by eyeball, its only a couple of decent chunks. Good luck and enjoy that brisket!

KCAL is correct. Start light on the wood and keep good notes. Better to under smoke it the first time than to be turned off by over-smoked or bitter taste.

Tell us how goes it!

Sorry to take so long reporting on my brisket...but first, this is what I did. First of all I rubbed a 11.5 pound packer with "Boogie Rub" and put it in the fridge for 24 hours. Put it in the smoker at 8 PM with four oz of hickory. IT was a tight fit, but I didn't have to fold it. It was 28 degrees outside, not too cold. Smoker set to 200 degrees- I used two remote thermometers. At 7 AM one therm said 175, the other 170. At noon, both therms were at 190. Poke test was not good. Put both therms into different parts of the brisket and they read 181 in the deckle, 171 in the flat. At 4:30 Pm both read 190 degrees. Poke test went well. Wrapped in foil with a brown sugar/vinegar sauce and put in the cooler until dinner at 6pm. Total cook time was 20.5 hours. Sliced up great...tender and delicious! The good news is that we had leftovers. They went into a food saver bag and into the freezer for a meal next week! I'll try to post some photos. Thanks for everyone's help!!

Sounds pretty dang good.

Did you have it on 200* the entire cook ?

yep- kept it at 200. I wasn't in a hurry (although i did panic a bit when the temps went down when I changed position of the probes). I would have upped the temp then, but we were ice skating in the backyard and I didn't want to feel compelled to take my skates off and check how things were doing...

Looks real good.

Yeah, can't trust them probes. It's only a starting point.

A lot of those slices look like they were falling apart. If that's the case, one thing you can do is cut them thicker to hold them together.

You can also separate the point from the flat and put it in to smoke longer. It'll be hot when you try to separate, but just follow the seam of fat.

I've tried to figure out a way to visualize the two, try this.

If you look at them from the side, the flat will be like Virginia and the Point will be like West Virginia (down the left side and comes up and over Virginia.

hehehe

Nice Q porn ! I just had a ribeye and all the fixins and now I am hungry for brisket !