This is a tale of two briskets, actually it’s two halves of the same brisket. I was craving a good brisket but I could not decide how I wanted to cook it. Did I want a traditional barbeque or did I want to make a New Mexican style red chile brisket? I decided to wait and see what briskets they had at my local Sam’s before I made a decision that could ruin my entire weekend.
So, I’m at Sam’s perusing my favorite section, the meat case. And then I spotted it, actually there was beam of sunlight shining down on it and I swear I heard angels singing, a 19lb brisket. This had to be one of the biggest hunks of beef I’d ever seen. It was the “beef de resistance” I was looking for.
 |
Nice Smoke Ring |
On my way home, I was so happy with my meat purchase that I forgot all about cooking time. Using my rule of 1 hour and 15 minutes per pound at 225F it was going to take 24 hours to cook. Now I love to spend my weekends cooking but not the whole freaking weekend. Fortunately, I was able to employ the divide and conquer technique, cutting the brisket in half. Two smaller briskets cook faster than one big brisket, it’s some thermodynamics thing, I don’t really know, I failed chemistry. So my dilemma was solved, I would cook two briskets, one with red chile and the other barbeque rub.
For some reason, I decided to smoke the briskets overnight. I don’t know what I was thinking; I must have been deliriously tired. I’ve never had any problems with the overnight cook, until now. I put the briskets on the egg and set the vents, the temp read 225F. Before bed I did one last check of the egg and everything looked good. What I overlooked was turning the vents down to account for increase in air as the charcoal burned down. Less charcoal, more air = more heat. When I woke up 6 hours later the temperature gauge read 350F and my briskets were done, a little overdone. Rut-rho! I violated the first (and most important) rule of BBQ, low and slow. I cut a test piece off and it looked good, really nice smoke ring, tasted good, the bark was a little dark but for the most part I dodged a bullet, it was still edible.
 |
Briskets, a little charred but otherwise OK. |
Because my brisket was already done I had to change up my red chile brisket recipe. I had to improvise another way to cook the red chile sauce into the brisket. What I ended up doing was slicing the brisket, placing it in a dish, covering it with the red chile sauce, and then baking it in the oven for an hour. This was not the vision I had for this dish, but it worked.
 |
Red Chile Sauce over brisket |
This meal starts with a bed of thick sliced fried potatoes, topped with the tender brisket and a heaping spoon of the red chile sauce for good measure, topped with sharp cheddar cheese. After taking that first big bite I forgot all about the trials and tribulations of the day. All of the flavors I was shooting for were there, the red chile sauce absorbed the smoky flavor from the beef and just elevated it to a whole new level. Not to mention, beef and fried potatoes, what’s not to love about that?? I’ll tell you if I ever open AlbuKirky The Restaurant, this will be my house specialty.
I was so worried this meal was going to be a disaster and all I would have to blog about was a big hot mess. When the smoke had cleared and the dust had settled, my red chile brisket tasted as good as I expected it too. I do believe I learn more from my mistakes than my successes, but success is a lot less stressful. If you want to see how I made this the first time, you can check out my Chile Con Brisket post. Oh, the other half is sitting in my fridge, more about that later.
Never read much about New Mexico style brisket but I like that idea a lot.
If you put red or green chile it's NM Style. Wait till you see my Green Chile Pork Butt post!