Brisket taking hours to go up 1 degree

[Conzo427]

The recipe that I have been using from the Traeger website doesn't make sense to me. They all say to set the smoker to 225 for the whole time, and cook until the internal temp is 204. That means that the temp of the smoker is only 21 degrees more than the target mean temp. It is of course going to take far longer toward the end of the cooking cycle then in the beginning. Yet all of the recipes say that it will take 6 hours or so to get to 160 degrees, then 3-6 hours to get to 204. What I experienced makes much more sense. The temp would climb faster in the beginning and slow down to a crawl as it approaches a similar temp to the ambient smoker temp. When my 4 lb brisket took 3 hours to go from 201 degrees to 202 degrees I started to question everything. At that rate, a 4 lb brisket would take at least 18 hours. Does this sound right?

Notice how the temp flatlines towards the end of the cooking cycle. I don't think it is a thermometer issue as when I removed it it went right down to the outside temperature.

 

[CMTiger]

If you’ve set your Traeger to 225 you may not even really be over the target temp of 204 by much that much…..if at all

 

[Conzo427]

If you’ve set your Traeger to 225 you may not even really be over the target temp of 204 by much that much…..if at all

that is what I'm confused about. How can the expectation be that we will ever reach 204? should I just keep smoking it until it does get there?

 

[good eats]

I suspect that if you measure the ambient temperature of the pit with a third party probe, you'll find that it's reading much less, than 225. probably in the area of 180 degrees. If you'll pardon the pun, that disparity between actual temperature and the readout on the Traeger has been a hot topic on here.

 

[RayClem]

Do you know for certain that your cook temperature is 225F. If you are not using a thermometer of known accuracy to check the controller temperature, your cook temperature might even be as low as 200F.

Likewise, if your internal meat probe is not accurate, you might be closer to 212F than you think.

The 160 F temperature that Trager references is called the stall point. It usually happens somewhere between 160-170F. When the protein reaches that temperature, all of the heat produced by the fire is needed to evaporate moisture from the surface of the meat. There is no additional heat available to increase the internal temperature of the protein. Thus, the internal temperature rise will be quite slow. Eventually, the meat will dry out and the temperature will begin rising once again.

When the internal temperature stalls, you have three choices:

1. You can leave the temperature at 225F and wait it out. This can add hours to the cook as you have learned.

2. You can remove the protein from the smoker, wrap it in either butcher paper or heavy duty aluminum foil and put it back in the smoker to finish. The wrapping traps evaporating moisture so that the meat steams inside. When cooking brisket, this is referred to as the Texas crutch. It greatly reduces the time needed to complete the cook. The disadvantage of this method is that the steam inside the wrapper can soften the bark that you have tried to develop during the initial stage of your cook.

3. The last method is to allow the temperature to remain at 225F until the cook reaches the stall. At that point, you can increase the cook temperature to 275F. That provides additional heat that will power through the stall. Once the protein reaches the stall temperature, little or no additional smoke will be absorbed into the meat. Thus, there is no disadvantage to increasing the cook temperature.

The same procedures apply anytime you are cooking a large piece of meat like brisket, pork shoulder, etc. I typically combine steps 2 and 3. I wrap the meat AND increase the cook temperature. That will greatly accelerate the cooking process are cut hours off the cook time.

When cooking any meats, it is important to allow the protein to rest after cooking to allow the juices to redistribute through the meat. For small pieces of meat like a steak or pork chop, a rest of a 10 minutes or so should be sufficient. For a full packer brisket, you should rest it for a couple of hours or more. Many of the brisket pros on the forum will wrap the brisket in foil, wrap it in a towel or small blanket and place it in a picnic cooler so it cools down slowly during several hours of rest. You should always plan for your cook to finish well before serving time to allow for this rest period.

BTW: My daughter and her family live in Stirling Ranch just a few miles SW from your location.

 

[Andy]

I did my first brisket the other day. I followed the Traeger app recipe. I used a whole hopper of pellets (nearly £18 worth) and same as the author, it stalled at 160. I raised the temp to 250 and wrapped in butchers paper and it eventually reached 204 at 2am - 16hrs after I started! The alarm woke me up and I let it rest. Couldn’t do a lot at 2am so I left it.
Hard as a rock and dry as a bone at 7am. What a waste of a piece of meat (and money/time)

 

[good eats]

I did my first brisket the other day. I followed the Traeger app recipe. I used a whole hopper of pellets (nearly £18 worth) and same as the author, it stalled at 160. I raised the temp to 250 and wrapped in butchers paper and it eventually reached 204 at 2am - 16hrs after I started! The alarm woke me up and I let it rest. Couldn’t do a lot at 2am so I left it.
Hard as a rock and dry as a bone at 7am. What a waste of a piece of meat (and money/time)

Andy, did you wrap the brisket in towels and place in a well insulated cooler for the rest period? That allows the meat to slowly cool and makes a big difference in juiciness as well as tenderness. The first brisket I ever cooked was several years ago, on my XL Big Green Egg. I did pretty much the same thing that you did and the end result was something that even an electric knife could barely slice. Also, I'm wondering if you used an instant-read thermometer to confirm the 204 finish temperature?
Now that I've learned to base all my temperatures on third party temp probes, I'm loving the results that I'm getting from my Traeger Timberline. In any event, don't be discouraged and keep on cooking. I'm finding that there is a bit of an unexpected learning curve associated with pellet grills and you'll prevail.

 

[GrillMeister]

I do my briskets at 180 for the first 3 hours, then bump it to 225 till internal temp reaches 165. I then wrap in butcher paper and bump the temp up to 250 till the brisket is done.

One thing I do is keep a drip pan of water inside the IW885. It provides needed moisture while collecting all the drippings. When I get up in the morning and open the grill to check, my glasses get fogged up from the moisture. Briskets turn out great this way and take about 15 hours total.

 

[MidwestSmoker]

I did my first brisket the other day. I followed the Traeger app recipe. I used a whole hopper of pellets (nearly £18 worth) and same as the author, it stalled at 160. I raised the temp to 250 and wrapped in butchers paper and it eventually reached 204 at 2am - 16hrs after I started! The alarm woke me up and I let it rest. Couldn’t do a lot at 2am so I left it.
Hard as a rock and dry as a bone at 7am. What a waste of a piece of meat (and money/time)

Just a gentle suggestion. I think we have all been there when we started and its not a waste, just part of the learning process. Briskets are perhaps the most difficult ones to get right.

As you progress, you will realize that temperature is perhaps not the best measure, particularly for briskets. I would say bark development, fat rendering and "probe tenderness" are more important. These are measures I use to decide if the brisket is done, the final temperature is just used as a confirmation.

 

[tomhooper]

I don't normally wrap while cooking. I just let it push through the stall on its own. I do however allow for up to 16 hours to cook a large packer brisket. After I reach 200 I wrap in butcher paper then in a towel and put it in an ice chest until time to slice and eat. I'll sometimes let it rest for 4 hours.
Agree on using a third party ambient temp probe along with third party IT probes also. Don't count on the built in ones. They are notoriously inaccurate.

Oh and I usually cook at between 215 and 220.

Here's one I did a couple of weeks back. 15 hour cook. 2 hour rest.

 

[Conzo427]

Do you know for certain that your cook temperature is 225F. If you are not using a thermometer of known accuracy to check the controller temperature, your cook temperature might even be as low as 200F.

Likewise, if your internal meat probe is not accurate, you might be closer to 212F than you think.

The 160 F temperature that Trager references is called the stall point. It usually happens somewhere between 160-170F. When the protein reaches that temperature, all of the heat produced by the fire is needed to evaporate moisture from the surface of the meat. There is no additional heat available to increase the internal temperature of the protein. Thus, the internal temperature rise will be quite slow. Eventually, the meat will dry out and the temperature will begin rising once again.

When the internal temperature stalls, you have three choices:

1. You can leave the temperature at 225F and wait it out. This can add hours to the cook as you have learned.

2. You can remove the protein from the smoker, wrap it in either butcher paper or heavy duty aluminum foil and put it back in the smoker to finish. The wrapping traps evaporating moisture so that the meat steams inside. When cooking brisket, this is referred to as the Texas crutch. It greatly reduces the time needed to complete the cook. The disadvantage of this method is that the steam inside the wrapper can soften the bark that you have tried to develop during the initial stage of your cook.

3. The last method is to allow the temperature to remain at 225F until the cook reaches the stall. At that point, you can increase the cook temperature to 275F. That provides additional heat that will power through the stall. Once the protein reaches the stall temperature, little or no additional smoke will be absorbed into the meat. Thus, there is no disadvantage to increasing the cook temperature.

The same procedures apply anytime you are cooking a large piece of meat like brisket, pork shoulder, etc. I typically combine steps 2 and 3. I wrap the meat AND increase the cook temperature. That will greatly accelerate the cooking process are cut hours off the cook time.

When cooking any meats, it is important to allow the protein to rest after cooking to allow the juices to redistribute through the meat. For small pieces of meat like a steak or pork chop, a rest of a 10 minutes or so should be sufficient. For a full packer brisket, you should rest it for a couple of hours or more. Many of the brisket pros on the forum will wrap the brisket in foil, wrap it in a towel or small blanket and place it in a picnic cooler so it cools down slowly during several hours of rest. You should always plan for your cook to finish well before serving time to allow for this rest period.

BTW: My daughter and her family live in Stirling Ranch just a few miles SW from your location.

This was really helpful. Thank you for taking the time to explain it all. Sterling Ranch is a nice area!

 

[Conzo427]

I ended up taking the brisket off at 202° according to my webber bluetooth thermometer. I wrapped it in towels and put it in a cooler for an hour and a half. It came out amazing! I never considered that the Traeger thermometer might be off. I guess I figured that thermometer technology has existed for a really long time so we must have it down by now.

 

[Clint62]

Towel..as in bathroom towel?

 

[tomhooper]

Yes. Or a blanket. Anything to hold the heat in.

 

[RayClem]

Towel..as in bathroom towel?

If you have a large beach towel, it will work well, as long as it does not have any sand remaining.