Brisket - too much fat?

[Vibe]

Hi all,

So I received an Australian brisket from Tom Hixsons today.


Would you say this was too much fat to cut off? I would approx the weight at 1KG


I actually stopped trimming and didn't go for 1/4 of an inch on the cap because I felt too much had already came off!



Thoughts?

All pictures can be seen here

Cheers
Kev

[essexsmoker]

I'd say up to 30% is normal. So of a 4.5kg brisket that would be about 1.4kg, so about right.
There is quite a lot of trim of fat and meat too if you are making it less burnable and pretty too.

[KayCeeSmoker]

I trim mine to 1/4" maximum. I'm not afraid of 1/8" either.

Thick fat keeps smoke and rub from penetration and takes longer to render.

All in my opinion; everyone has their own style.

[Wabby]

Looks good.

Any tips on where I can buy a brisket at reasonable prices, rather than the astronomical ones I am being quoted by my local 'butcher'.?

[Kiska95]

Hi there boys n girls,

The brisket debate, well I have been doing a load of research lately and cooking the buggers too.

It started when I got a 6.6kg brisket from T & G at £50 and had to trim a kilo plus of hard fat off and there was still a massive amount still on there and no real point! I complained and to their credit I got sent another one which was better but not great. However the flavour when cooked was sublime and all the fat did render out. Now these guys are charging £8.10 per kilo and some up to £10 quid and that folks is for the fat too, but is it just because its popular or have they no choice?

Well me and my butcher mate set up an experiment. We bought in a full brisket on the bone. But just to quantify the brisket is the fattiest cut on the animal so seeing one in its original state was an eye opener it was 18.5kg at the start. Now we trimmed out the curved chine bone and that is where the most of fat is . We cut off the plate ribs and removed the other ribs from the brisket. Now we only had to trim a small amount of fat from the whole thing, I would say less than 500gms. The finished brisket weighed in at 8.5 kg and was ready for the smoker. The whole 18.5kg brisket cost me £65 and that's my butcher mate making some money too. I got my brisket, a set of beef (plate) ribs and a rack of African ribs all for the £65 and they all cooked great. On the next one we cut the plate (beef Ribs) a little larger.

The problem for the local butcher is that if you only want the brisket he is left with the plate and the African ribs which is not viable to sell. To sell the brisket trimmed he would have to sell it at around £7 to £7.50 to make it worth while. Now you see in selling a brisket around 6.5KG the boys in London are keeping the price around £50 but at an extra £1.00 per kilo extra they are not making as much as you think especially with free delivery. By the way the meat I was receiving from the London Butchers came from a farm just 50 miles from where I live in the North East! LOL!

Moral of the story get your local butcher to get a brisket on the bone if you are going to shell out, it only takes 10 minutes to bone out so no great labour for him otherwise these lads selling brisket on line at around £8.00 are doing alright by me, its the ones selling at a tenner per KG that you should avoid.

Try Albert Matthews butchers in Bury they do good briskets and deliver, ask for Chris and mention the Forum

Hope that helps a little

[Vibe]

Kiska,

Would it be possible for you and your butcher friend to write up something to help with our local butchers?

I have shown pictures and still not got what I want - so far I haven't asked for Brisket as I don't want to waste £50 there for something that wasn't what I asked for. As my local butchers has quite a few staff it's not the kind of place you get on first name terms so no mates there - so wouldn't be able to go in a cut up with them etc. and would expect them to make some money from doing this for me.

Also just noticed the Tom Hixson's one was £40 for 4.5KG then £15 delivery (15% off the brisket at the moment so all in for like £49). Whereas the one you mention (Albert Mathews) do theirs @ 6KG min for £53.55 all in (incl del). So will try Albert Mathews next time.

Cheers.

[KayCeeSmoker]

From the Virtual Weber Bullet website: http://virtualweberbullet.com/brisketselect.html

With the thought that a picture is worth 1000 words, here's how they break down a US beef carcass at the University of Kentucky. The brisket cutting is 12:15 to 17:45.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PBGvoEFE74

Hope that helps.

[Kiska95]

Great references KC!

Unfortunately our butchers cut meat slightly differently than your guys and also the meat is different too! Where you have Black Angus, Prime, Choice, Select or Standard we just have beef! almost all fat trimmed off as the British housewife wont pay for fat. They look for lean and wont accept marbling so most of our commercially bred meat would be bred to select or standard quality.

Our Briskets are also totally devoid of fat and rolled, so getting a local butcher to understand a packer cut Brisket is very difficult

[KayCeeSmoker]

Yes, I understand.

As I've posted in other threads, I'm coming over in a couple of weeks and plan to do some 'Que for my hosts. I have some trepidation about taking on a British Brisket!

I know how to handle one of ours but yours will be a new challenge.

Ah well..man/meat/smoke/fire. What could possibly go wrong?

[Kiska95]

Hi

Here is a little insight as to why we are used to having little fat on our meat................

"It turns out that fat is good for more than introducing flavour and moistness, it’s also pretty good for making bombs. During World War II, handing over cooking fat to the government was doing your duty.
In America "The American Fat Salvage Committee" was created to urge housewives to save all the excess fat rendered from cooking and donate it to the army to produce explosives. fats are used to make glycerine, and glycerine is used to make things blow up.
Fats were also needed in higher quantities for industrial and military use. For example, the Navy used lard to grease their guns, so the butchers handed it over and as such it was rationed.