Since I asked a question in the Q&A section, only fair I pass along a recipe that was passed along to me--the single greatest brisket I've ever had the pleasure of having. It's sorta complicated and takes the better part of a day, but it's WELL worth it.
The rub:
1 cup sugar
1/4 cup season salt
1/4 cup garlic salt
1/4 cup onion salt
1/4 cup celery salt
1/3 cup paprika, 1/2 cup if desired
1/4 cup chili powder
1/4 cup black pepper
1 teaspoon ground mustard
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1/2 teaspoon all spice
1/4 teaspoon ground clove
1 teaspoon ginger (I've had good success removing this item and using cumin, as well)
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon nutmeg
The mop:
3/4 cup apple cider vinegar
1 can of beer (I always use Michelob)
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 tablespoon of the rub
2 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon black pepper
* Mix mop ingredients together, heat up and simmer for 10 minutes
The mustard:
1 cup yellow mustard
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon sea salt (has to be sea salt...needs to be very fine)
1/2 teaspoon hot sauce
*Mix together, simmer for 10 minutes.
The BBQ sauce:
1/2 cup finely chopped onions
2 tablespoons butter
1 cup tomato sauce
1 cup ketchup
1/3 cup chili sauce
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup honey
1 cup white vinegar
1 teaspoon allspice
1 tablespoon dry mustard
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
2 teaspoons chili powder
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon paprika
3 tablespoons lemon juice
3 tablespoons maple syrup
(OPTIONAL): I sometimes add a couple shakes of habernero sauce to this, but it tends to *really* heat things up. Use at own risk.
*Heat large sauce pan to medium, saute the onions in the butter until they go soft. Add everything else and bring up to a boil, then lower heat and simmer for another 20 minutes.
The piece de resistance:
1 whole brisket, about 8 pounds
The prep:
Rub the brisket well with the dry rub--more ya rub it in, the better it'll be. It breaks up the connective tissues or some such. Refrigerate it overnight.
The heat:
Get your smoker up between 200 and 220 degrees. You'll need 6 cups of wood chips (I prefer hickory; my wife prefers mesquite...I'm right). Soak 1/3 of them in water for half an hour. Trim the brisket of all but 1/4 of an inch of fat and let set at room temperature for an hour to get the inside of the meat the same temp as the outside. Put in 1 cup wet wood chips to 2 cupsdry into the smoker, toss the brisket on, and mop with the mustard sauce. Cook it for 3 hours, add the remaining wood chips and mop with the beer based mop sauce this time.
Cook it for another 2 hours, then transfer the brisket onto some heavy duty aluminum foil and "bowl" it, pour about 1/3 cup of the beer based mop into the bowl, and close up the aluminum foil and seal the whole thing up tight. Put the wrapped brisket back on the smoker and cook it for another 2-5 hours--remove when the internal temperature reaches 185. Remove the brisket from the pouch, tent and let rest for about 15 minutes. Cover it with the barbecue sauce and become the envy of those around you.
. Took me a lot of experimenting before I tried taking a page out of the corned beef playbook and making a mustard mop to "see what would happen", which really brought the whole thing together on a whole new level. I had never tried it with a 4 pounder before so couldn't offer advise as to how long it would take. It's such a long cooking process that I prefer to do it at once as opposed to two cookings, and even for a household of just 2, an 8 pounder (since it cooks down to...I dunno, 5 or 6 pounds?) doesn't last long enough for it to even start to become kind of "old" tasting, let alone bad what with all the randomly walking by the fridge and pulling out a slice to munch on.
