SM150 and 22lb full packer brisket

Welcome to the forum.

Since this is your 1st smoke on the SM150, I'd suggest keeping things as simple as possible. It will provide you a baseline for future briskets.

I would use a temp setting of 250...would cook fat side down in the middle shelf setting and go with 4 oz of one wood type. Pecan works well with beef.

There's no need to foil. Use 2 digital probes (flat and point end) and keep the door shut until you're at 194. Then test for tender. Verify the internal temp at say, 250 before you cook.

Time will depend on post-trim weight. My guess is you'll be looking at 1 to 1.25 hrs/lb post-trim weight.

Smoke rings do not naturally occur in an electric smoker. You can add some Kingsford briquettes (yes, Kingsford ) to the wood pan and that may produce a slight SR.

Good luck. Let us know how it turns out.

Where did you find a 22 lb brisket? Choice...Select or ___?

Hello Max
Thanks for the reply
I found a 22lb full packer brisket from a meat distributor.

I will post how it turns out in a couple of weeks

Personally, I'd use two fist size chunks of pecan and leave the apple out.

Between the two fine cooks above,you have gotten about as good advice as you might get.

Max had a decent question about ?where?,since sometimes huge can mean an old?
.Also,the "choice " section of the meat grade triangle could be 3/4 of the beef produced.That could be down by the select,cutter,etc.

That said,The C.A.B distributor for Central FL found 10 cases for us a few years ago ,all over 20 lbs. and we got a lot of good sections from those we bought.Bill ,of the Dixie Chicks,used to only cook one packer-always over 20 lbs and he won a lot with them.

Cooks taught me over the years that your finished product might be determined by what you start with.

My 160 is a 1994 and it is a dandy brisket cooker.Don't blame it,if this one doesn't pan out for you.

Thanks Tom for you reply

My main concern is if I do not pull and wrap the brisket at 165 degrees will it be to dry ?
I was told that cooking in the SM150 tends to keep meats moist compared to other types of cookers


What are your thoughts

I'm not Tom, but he's trained enough of us brisket cooks that I could pretty much tell you his reply......"just depends"

Is it a good quality brisket, are you gonna cook it to the correct doneness? You'll need both of those answers to be yes.....

I have no clue when foiling a brisket became fashionable but I'll bet someone with a stick-burner came up with the idea due to the amount of air that flows thru a well built pit, let alone a drafty one. A few of the FEC100 owners doing well in competition this year wrap as well. It's a matter of personal preference.

As someone who cooked on a SM100 for a few years, if you're smoking a quality (well striated/marbled packer) you don't need to wrap using a 150.

Like I said,good cooks already gave good answers.

quote:

Originally posted by MaxQ:
Welcome to the forum.

Since this is your 1st smoke on the SM150, I'd suggest keeping things as simple as possible. It will provide you a baseline for future briskets.

I would use a temp setting of 250...would cook fat side down in the middle shelf setting and go with 4 oz of one wood type. Pecan works well with beef.

There's no need to foil. Use 2 digital probes (flat and point end) and keep the door shut until you're at 194. Then test for tender. Verify the internal temp at say, 250 before you cook.

Time will depend on post-trim weight. My guess is you'll be looking at 1 to 1.25 hrs/lb post-trim weight.

Smoke rings do not naturally occur in an electric smoker. You can add some Kingsford briquettes (yes, Kingsford ) to the wood pan and that may produce a slight SR.

Good luck. Let us know how it turns out.

Where did you find a 22 lb brisket? Choice...Select or ___?

One can in fact get a naturally occurring smokering on a brisket in a CookShack electric without using any type of cure or charcoal. I have photo proof.

Care to share?

From an earlier Rabbit post:
smokering

Wow that's a whole lot of brisket !

That started out as a 14 pounder. Not all that large as far as briskets go. That was cooked in an old model Smokette.

I thought I would post here because my sm105 seems similar in construction to the sm150, though mine is quite old. My first full brisket didn't come out as I had hoped and thought I would toss out my observations and see what the experts think. By way of background, grew up in Texas cooking on various size stick burners. After relocating to New England and building my own pit, I picked up a used sm105 to use in December - February because I'm lazy, and also had an inkling to do this professionally someday. That day has arrived and I've been operating a short while from a converted class c motor home. The idea is to use the Cookshack for everyday cooking and periodically pull out the stick burner for dog and pony shows. It also occurred to me that I could train someone to use the cookshack with a fairly regimented procedure.

It took me about 3 years of casual cooking in the sm105 to closely replicate pork ribs that come off my stick burner. However, I always did my briskets in my custom pit until now. Have experimented with a few flats stuck in the cookshack when doing ribs, but seem to always cook them wrapped, a little longer in my kitchen oven before they are tender, and with mixed results.

Bought what I thought was a nicely proportioned CAB brisket, 13 lbs out of the packaging, 9.5 lbs trimmed. Much of the weight removed was from the big honking chunk of hard fat between the point and flat, and the remainder coming from the fat side, leaving roughly 1/4" (also trimmed the edges to remove the brown portions and expose fresh meat for my rub). Put the meat on the middle shelf, diagonally across the rack, point end toward the back, in a cold oven fat side down. I used 8.5 oz of oak and 1 lump of Kingsford in fire box. Cooked at 250 for 9 hours, then hold at 140. My rig is kept in a storage facility, so I started it and left it to cook overnight. Arrived this morning, after holding for about 1.25 hours at 140. Top of the brisket was really dark and a little hard in most places, inside not quite dry, but definitely over done, but yet still edible as coarsely chopped beef.

When cooking 6 racks of St Louis or Baby Backs (avg 2.5 - 3lbs) along with 16-17 lbs of county style pork ribs (ie cut and trimmed pork shoulder), I generally cook at 225, for 4 hours with the fire box 80-90% full of oak + 1 lump of Kingsford. This seems to work in my smoker, with ribs on upper shelves. I check the meat after cooking 3.5 hours and generally stop cooking and force the smoker into holding at 140 between 3.5 and 4 hours of cooking.

Observations:
Not as much smoke flavor as expected. I was a little surprised to read how much less wood most people use in the fire box.

Color seemed about what I expected.

Tenderness - below the 1/8" dried out top layer, was rather tender meat.

Juiciness - on the dryer side of acceptable, but acceptable.

Texture - fell apart with moderate handling, had to be careful when slicing, not to tear it up.

Overall - the point was certainly better than the flat, and had more edible meat, but it could be a lot better. The fat, seemed to be rendered appropriately.

Variables to play with....I'm tempted to go back to my 225 cooking temp and load the fire box up with more oak, and cook another CAB of similar size for 8 hours, then check.

Also tempted to replace Tyme Chef with Cookshack IQ controller, or possibly a PID controller of my own choosing. (I am handy with electronics)

Manual for oven says to fill oven to 50% or more of capacity. Not sure how having only 9.5 lbs of meat inside effected outcome, but adding another brisket doubles the cost of mistakes.

For those unfamiliar with the sm105, the temperature probe in this oven is located between the 2nd and 3rd (middle) shelf, on which I put the brisket. Not sure if proximity of meat to thermostat sensor played a role.

I'm probably missing much more, but just wondering which variable to start tweaking.

I certainly appreciate any suggestions offered.

Needed to know what temp was brisket taken to. Suggest you go to top of this forum and go through the Brisket 101 etc. to get info on using and electric smoker, expecially on the Amerique. Briskets usually have to be taken to about 200 deg =/- to be tender.

quote:

Originally posted by gstan:

quote:

Cooked at 250 for 9 hours, then hold at 140.

Did you cook on time & temp as you stated or to an internal temp before holding. I HIGHLY recommend not doing that until you have this down pat. It's a new cooker with new variables, so don't "set it and forget it"

quote:

Color seemed about what I expected.

How's that? Many time I see people talk about a "gray" appearance and that is because of the excessive moisture in the electric smokers.

quote:

Tenderness - below the 1/8" dried out top layer, was rather tender meat.

The dryness is a function of what the temp was when it went to hold, if it was overcooked (I'd say it was because you said it was dry and too tender) it's also a function of the rub in that environment. Also, was the fat up or down? I find in the 150 I had that fat down was better since the heat comes from down there. Also, I don't fall for the old pitmasters tale that you have to cook fat side up.

quote:

Juiciness - on the dryer side of acceptable, but acceptable.

Experiment with what internal temp you pull it at.

quote:

Texture - fell apart with moderate handling, had to be careful when slicing, not to tear it up.

Overdone.

quote:

Overall - the point was certainly better than the flat, and had more edible meat, but it could be a lot better. The fat, seemed to be rendered appropriately.

Point has more fat so it will also be "moist". That's the way they sell them in Texas. Regular or Moist

quote:

Variables to play with....I'm tempted to go back to my 225 cooking temp and load the fire box up with more oak, and cook another CAB of similar size for 8 hours, then check.

Don't play with too many variables at once then you won't know what worked and what didn't?

quote:

Also tempted to replace Tyme Chef with Cookshack IQ controller, or possibly a PID controller of my own choosing. (I am handy with electronics)

quote:

Manual for oven says to fill oven to 50% or more of capacity. Not sure how having only 9.5 lbs of meat inside effected outcome, but adding another brisket doubles the cost of mistakes.

It has to do with how the unit heats/cools off/heats. You don't HAVE to but you will find the temp swings level out. I cooked a LOT of time in a 150 with only one brisket.

quote:

I'm probably missing much more, but just wondering which variable to start tweaking.

Go with the smoke profile you want. If it wasn't smoky, then add more wood. I consulted with a Restaurant in Texas and they wanted SMOKY so I had them load it up with as much wood as they could AND they added more after that burned off. It's all subjective.

The smoke ring in electric is hindered by the amount of wood and the large amount of humidity. If you need help with that let us know.

I yield to the master.

quote:

Originally posted by G Que:
I yield to the master.

Nope, you did just fine. I saw a bunch of questions and felt the writing urge

quote:

Originally posted by G Que:
I yield to the master.

No, tom is the Brisket Master

You said exactly the right thing, I was just in a wordy mood

I have a 150... I take my brisket to just around 200. The Cookshack is a moist environment you do not need to foil it during the cooking process. Yeah take it out, let it rest, separate the flat from the tip, foil the flat. Then apply a little rub to the tip and back in about 90 minutes for burnt ends... The Cookshack is the best, the 150 a marvelous model, but you need to take a brisket to about 200 to get a very tender product...
I've done my share of briskets and 200 is ideal.

Thank you all for your replies. I was able to dial it in today. The smoker is not new to me, I've actually been cooking in it for about 5 years, just not brisket. One of the best suggestions I read on this site was to keep a diary of the cooks performed in the smoker, and I've been rather diligent in doing so, the list of characteristics in my earlier post is what I came up with in the beginning and have used to evaluated since.

My temps mentioned in the previous post were oven temps.

I put two briskets in last night at 8:45PM, and returned 5AM, 8.25 hours later and found the internal temps of 185 and 190. Let them go to internal temps of 190 and 194, took them out, wrapped, cooled a little, then into the Cambro. Total cook time was 11.75 hours. The brisket on the top shelf was CAB, 14LBS/12.5LBS pre/post trim, pulled and wrapped at 190 internal temp. The other brisket was Choice, 12LBS/9.5LBS pre/post trim, placed on the third shelf, pulled and wrapped at internal temp of 194. Fire box was 90% full of oak with one lump of charcoal and the oven temp was set at 225.

The CAB on the top shelf was overall about what I like to see, and the Choice on third shelf was slightly overdone for my particular taste. This may sound critical, but I was really happy with the overall execution of the cook and my fledgling customer base seemed to like them. In the past, I've not cooked better quality briskets, like these, and certainly not a CAB. The thought crossed my mind that possibly, the better quality meat may not need as much time to cook, or need to reach as high of internal temps mentioned above. Another thought was that maybe my thermostat in the oven is a little off and I may actually be cooking at a higher temp than I thought. Next cook will have an additional probe to measure oven temp.

My little business is just starting and I look forward to needing to cook more briskets per day. One thing I still wonder about is how far away from the thermostat probe (between the 2nd and third shelf) should I keep the meat? The rails inside the SM105 have two sets of holes for different shelf heights. Any thoughts on configuration if cooking heavier meats?

Once again, thank you all for your responses and help.

Gee SmokinOkie, I think of you as a SENSI and this forum is your DOJO.

I'm more of an Obi-Wan Got the white beard too. Lol

Thanks for the kind words.As it happens,Smokin' and I both have been cooking on CS160s for many years.Amazing what you can learn from your mistakes,when you write them down .Then adjust a small bit at a time.
yes, the founder of the original CS developed it as the best brisket cooker around,over a half century ago.
If we let it do it's thing,it makes great food.