4lb 11oz Boneless Chuck Roast
Should be about 6-7 hours at 250°. It ended up being 5 hours and 45 mins.
Thursday night: Dry brine with a generous coating of sea salt and left overnight.
Friday 8:30am: Injected with beef tallow, beef bouillon and Jim Beam Honey. Left for an hour for the injection to settle.
9:20am: Prepped the fire with a ¾ full chimney. Smoker basket set to full minion. No water in the bowl. Chimney up and running/lit by 9:30am.
Air temp 79°. Sunny with light cloud. No wind.
I set up the grates and Weber iGrill.
9:40am: Mustard slathered and rubbed the beef with mainly pepper, garlic powder and paprika. Just a little salt because it will still have the dry brine salt.
9:50: Added the lit coals from the chimney to the minion set up in the smoker basket.
10am: Stuck the beef on the lower rack with a probe.
10:20am:
Lid temp reading a good 250°.
Meat temp: 91°.
Smoke now invisible.
11am:
Lid temp still reading a good 250°.
Meat temp: 125°.
11:45am: It started to piss down. Thunder and lightning.
Lid temp had dropped to about 220° but I had also added some sausages and bacon to the top grill at 11am.
Meat temp: 140°.
Air temp: 80°.
1pm: Lid temp around 225°. I added some blocks of apple wood. I also put some Armadillo eggs on the top grate.
Meat temp: 153°.
I’m supposed to leave it until it hits 160°. This should take at least three to four hours (maybe longer).
2pm (four hours in): Meat temp seems to have stalled at 155°. I really wanted it to get up to 160° before the wrap. I livened up the coals.
2:10pm: I wrapped it tight (in foil) with the remnants of the injection mix. I stuck the probe in a different side and it registered 160°.
Smoker temp had dropped to about 200°.
I livened it up again with a shake and it rose to about 230°.
Target meat temp is 195°-200° (over 205° it will pull/shred versus slice).
3pm:
Lid temp 230°.
Meat temp: 174°.
Air temp: 80°
3:45pm: Meat hit 195°. So I took it out of the smoker (still wrapped) and wrapped further with towels.
Left it to rest until 5:30pm then unwrapped and poured off the juice to use as a dip. Re-wrapped.
6:30pm. Transported it to my dad’s house for his birthday treat. Sliced and served.
This was very tasty. The centre cuts in particular were tender and juicy and a pour of the saved meat jus over everything was lovely. Let’s be very honest here: there’s a reason this is called “poor man’s brisket.” As tasty as it it was, it just doesn’t have the suppleness or oozing juice of a brisket. It also took about half the time and effort to cook!
Tip: Wait until the absolute VERY last minute to slice and serve. This was sliced, sitting and waiting for about 20 mins before we ate it. Also note, the meat in the picture above is only about a third of all the meat we had.