A week after I broke in my new Guru Pit Minder I decided to put it to the test again, this time with a 10 lb brisket. I decided that, in addition to my normal rub of Dizzy Cow Lick and Turbinado sugar, that I would inject this brisket with a mixture of Dr. Pepper, Dizzy Cow Lick, and yellow mustard. I bought a cheap injector and it wiorked OK until clogging - here's a helpful hint, if you're going to use an injector, make sure all of your injectable ingredents are very fine (i.e., coarse ground rubs WILL clog the injector).
Here's a pic of the brisket after having been rubbed and injected.
This time I decided to control the temperature at the cooking level, so I clamped the Guru temp probe to my Polder probe which was stuck in the middle of the brisket. Again, I set my Guru setpoint to 225, but this time it was 225 at the COOKING LEVEL, thus my dome temp actually indicated 250 during the cook. This time I also made sure that I had plenty of lump in the firebox, and threw in a couple of hickory chunks as well.
Here's the Guru bringing the Egg up to equilibrium. Typically now I will wait until the Egg is about 50 degrees from where I want it to be, then attach the Guru and let it do the rest. I should also note here that when I use the Guru I typically leave the slide part of the daisy wheel 100% closed, and the daisy wheel holes 100% open, if you know what I mean.
This brisket cooked faster than I anticipated - when I woke up the next morning, 13 hours later, the internal temp was already at 195, and I usually like to pull briskets at 185 internal. So, I went ahead and pulled this sucker off, rested him in a cooler for about 3 hours, then sliced and served. I must say that the injectable marinade made a noticeable difference in flavor (for the good), but the brisket itself was a bit on the dry side this time - I should have got out of bed an hour earlier. Still very yummy, tbough! And, of course, the Guru performed flawlessly once again, holding the dome temp stable throughout the night.
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