Beef......

With summer quickly coming to an end it's time to cram as many fair weather grilling sessions in as possible. This time around I decided to take my first stab at smoking a beef brisket. I had never done this before so a lot of internet research was conducted. Everything I found online said that briskets are always between 8-10lbs, so at an hour a pound I was going to have a long day ahead of me. A sigh of relief was breathed however when I found 3-4lb flat briskets at the local food hole. With the meat purchased I spent some time looking at dry rub recipes but already had a good idea of what I wanted to use. In a recent visit to Portsmouth Brewery I had the house reuben sandwich featuring beef brisket dry rubbed with a lot of black pepper. I loved it so a simple mixture of salt, brown sugar, and black pepper was applied to the meat the night before. The meat will be cooked in an aluminum pan to hold all the juices in and to prevent the bottom from drying out.


Facing a much more reasonable 3 hours of smoking, I got the coals going. The chimney starter is an absolute must have for any charcoal grilling/smoking. For about 25 bucks you never have to use lighter fluid again, and the coals are ready in as little as ten to fifteen minutes.


After soaking the hickory wood chips for a couple hours everything was ready and the smoking began. Randy really enjoyed the aroma as you can see.




A few hours later we all feasted on the brisket, BBQ baked beans, and some jalapeno cornbread. My beer of choice to pair with this hearty meal was Allagash Black. The maltiness and roasted flavors of the beer paired up perfectly with the beans and brisket and helped turn the jalapeno heat down. Taber n' Jess brought down a homemade apple pie for dessert that was amazing and helped put the finishing touch on another successful Sunday.