My brisket went sideways at a family reunion in Ohio

I was smoking a 15 pound brisket at my cousin's place near Columbus. The firebox door popped open around 3 AM and the temp dropped from 250 to 160 while I was asleep. I woke up to cold smoke and the stall hitting way too early. I wrapped it in butcher paper and cranked the heat to 300 to push through. The bark came out decent but the flat was dry in spots. Has anyone else messed up an overnight cook because of a loose latch?

2 comments

2 Comments

blair_gibson781mo ago

Honestly man, is your brisket really ruined or are you just being dramatic? I've had briskets fall off the smoker onto the grass, picked em up and washed em off, and they still came out fine. A 90 degree temp drop for a few hours isn't gonna ruin anything. The stall hitting early is just physics, the meat's gonna do what it wants. That flat being dry probably just means you didn't let it rest long enough or sliced it wrong. People act like brisket is brain surgery but it's really just meat and heat. Probably tasted fine to everyone at the reunion.

stella9041mo ago

Wait, I gotta push back on one thing - you said the stall is "just physics" but it's actually way more than that. The stall happens when moisture evaporation on the surface cools the meat down, yeah, but it's also about the collagen breaking down into gelatin. That's chemistry, not just physics. And that 90 degree drop for "a few hours" - if it's 90 degrees below target for more than a couple hours in the danger zone, you're flirting with food safety issues. I've had a stall hit early and it messed with my cook time so bad I had to wrap in butcher paper and crank the heat. Not ruined, but definitely not my best work. And the flat being dry? Could be slicing wrong, sure, but it could also be that the meat didn't get enough intramuscular fat rendering during the cook. Resting helps but it can't fix what didn't happen during the smoke.