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What temp did you end up pulling at?
202-208 in parts of it. The tenderness was much tighter in spots vs a regular brisket cook.
Nice, thanks!
Mahvulous!!
They all look phenomenal but that Ruben at the end tho. Good lord. Ima need a few minutes of alone time. Well done sir, we’ll done indeed!
I'll be in my bunk
Thanks. I was going to toast it and melt the cheese etc but I said screw it.
The sandwich?
Holy smokes.
That was dedication and looks well worth it. Kudos to you!
Thanks 😀
That came out perfect!
It was so good. Thanks
That looks incredible
That looks so good! On an unrelated note, I didn't know you could still get the Midnight Sun pattern!
Thanks. And thanks on the plate design, they are older hand me downs
That pattern is the bomb! I’ve had them for 30 years. Need a few replacements.
Wow
Looks great!
Did you run out of foil? Looks great
Thanks! No that was intentional. I tried the “foil boat” technique.
As someone who has done a LOT of pastrami on my WSM... Nice...
I haven't done a pastrami from scratch in a long time, I've loaded up on corned beef around St Paddy's while it's on sale and gone from there for a while.
I might have to change that, this is perfection! Great inspirational post!
Thanks! I’ve smoked the store bought corned beef a few times and this isn’t even in the same ballpark.
This was well worth the effort and I highly recommend trying it.
I've done from a raw brisket before, I must've fouled it up corning it because it wasn't any different than store bought. Seriously this is telling me to try again. Thanks for sharing the process and recipe!
Do it! I was worried that I would either not cure it all the way or it would be too salty. But it was neither. The store stuff was always way too salty for me, even after days of desalination. This was absolutely just perfect.
This is one of my favorite things to smoke!
Lol I used to have those plates. Looks delicious.
That looks absolutely delicious. Gratz on a great cook. 👏🏻
looks awesome! love the fat cap % you left. that’s my jam
Damn man you nailed it! I need one of those reubens in my life stat
Damn that looks excellent. Nicely done
Hot damn that looks good.
Looks bomb sir!
Bravo
Oh my god, that looks amazing. I'm going to have try this.
Looks great! I love to make pastrami, and really dig the boat for the steaming aspect of it. I usually pull it (165-180) and steam to 205+/- in oven but have been wanting to try that route. I recently pastrami'd some short ribs I had and that was really good too, worth the effort. Nice work man!!
Thanks! I was really thinking about steaming it like Katz etc but decided to ride it out on the smoker to 205.
I love it. I'll be honest sometimes that stall hits hard on my smoker (that's why I say I pull 165-180 which is kind of a big range) and I'll be 9 hours in and still in that range and just pull it because I know it's another couple hours in oven and it's already 11pm or something. I usually do larger briskets though and am thinking I should try a bit smaller or maybe cut into two.
Yeah this one was stalling in the 190s for a while which was weird. Maybe because of the cure?
I’ll have to try that oven idea next, thanks dude
Its like any brisket with the stall being longer than say ribs or something. When I use the oven for the steam portion I use a steam rack in a roasting pan, and will leave it uncovered for a bit at like 275.. and then usually cover it and raise temp up to maybe 300-325 until IT hits 205.
What recipe did you follow?
I posted the process in the comments
Didn't toast the bread bud?
Nah I was going to but was tired. Was going for a Katz style sandwich anyways. Maybe with the leftovers I will
Homie you cooked it 10 hours. You couldn't toast your bread the last 5 minutes of resting time?
Brah the meat was so good that you wouldn’t even care if the bread was toasted or not.
I make pastrami all the time. I pulled 6 briskets out of brine today. For real though not toasting the bread was just a Busch league move
Blah blah blah
I’ll only do this the lazy mans way with pre-made corned beef from the grocery store. Soak it in water overnight to pull out some salt, season and smoke. Game over
Yep I've done the pre-made corned beef a few times but this was on a whole other level.
I feel like my pastrami always comes out too salty.
I was worried the same thing might happen here but it was the perfect amount of saltiness and wasn't over bearing at all. One thing about brining your own, is you can control the salt level a bit more.
Is brisket and pastrami the same cut of meat?
Brisket is a cut of beef, pastrami is a method of curing and smoking/steaming meat.
You can make pastrami from elk, deer, caribou, chicken, etc. The deli stuff from your supermarket is often bottom round, cured, smoked and then streamed under pressure. Lots of yield with low waste yet still sold at pastrami prices.
That is why a lot of us make our own.
Great answer. Thanks
I was stressing over this being a first and that I would screw something up…. And I don’t like to toot my own horn or anything… But this tasted incredible.
Details:
A small 7lb prime packer brisket. Trimmed to maybe 6.5lbs as the butcher already cut it pretty lean. Poked holes in it with a knife.
I used “pop’s brine” recipe (look it up), plus garlic and store bought pickling spices. Brined for 7 days, flipping every day. Desalinated for 1 day.
Dried off, used a mustard binder. Added rub which was manually crushed peppercorns and coriander, almost half and half. Plus some mustard powder.
Smoked on the 18” WSM with oak, at 220-250 untouched for about 6 hours. Spritzed when needed.
Once I was happy with the bark, I used a half assed “foil boat” which I don’t think did much for me.
Took almost 10 hours total which surprised me. Probe checking for tenderness is also a little different vs regular brisket, I’m guessing because of the curing process.
Anyways… it was really phenomenal and I’m glad I made it.