Brisket 1 me 0...cooking **** up

[SDarkRage]

A rough estimate for cook time with a brisket is 1.5 hours per pound. That’s just to get you in the ballpark. It will still probably take another hour after that to finish it. Plus you need to wrap it in foil and let it rest for at least 1 hour, but 2 is better.
Example: 10 pound brisket X 1.5 hours equals 15 hour smoke at 225. Add in the extra hour to rest you are looking at 16 hours.

 

[dennishoddy]

I trim 85% of the fat, separate the flat from the tip to smoke. We did BBQ cook off competitions for a few years.

We always trimmed to get the rub into the meat yet retained enough fat to keep the surface wet with the fat while cooking as it rendered.

 

[SDarkRage]

What Dennis said above with the fat is important. Don’t cut it all off, but definetly trim it down. I usually trim the fat all down to about 1/8” thick evenly across the brisket. The thicker the fat, the longer it takes too cook under that cap. This means that the thinner parts of your meat will dry out long before the parts under the fat reach temp.