re: One meat I struggle with smoking is the brisket.

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I'm trusting all your temperatures are accurate. With that said, I don't see anything wrong in your process. Do you mop the meat during the process? Have you tried a pan with foil on top instead of butcher paper just to check results? After reading about everyone's love for the butcher paper, I will be trying it in the next couple of weeks. Until now, I have used the pan when it was time to wrap (at 160-165 degrees)

Something I have been experimenting with that I think other people should try is beef tallow. The scraps of fat you cut off during trimming of the brisket, put in cast iron or something else you don’t mind going in the smoker and render them down during the smoke along with the brisket. Use the juice from that and put that all over your wrapping paper and your brisket at wrapping.

I think this is something Franklin does, watch the 24 hours at Franklin YouTube video. When they probe the paper, all kinds of liquid comes out, it doesn’t look normal for just a moist brisket, but some other liquid added too. He talks about making tallow in other videos at his restaurant too.

Rewrapping before rest with more tallow might add some more flavor/moisture too. The delivery Franklin briskets had you use butter to reheat and get more moisture, tallow should have a better effect.

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I use an offset, and try to stick with prime. Smoke at 275, wrap with butcher paper at 160. Keep water pan full. I check how it feels at internal temp of 200, but sometimes I have to take it to 205. I get consistent, good results as far as tenderness, moist, and nice bark.

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I do similar. Can't do a true offset on my Primo, but I use a water pan, wrap at 165, and rest at 200. I mainly cook flats and season them the night before. When I wrap, I include some beef broth or au jus that I saved from the last brisket. For the last one I did, I sauteed a diced onion, tomato, and chipoltle peppers in Adobo sauce, then added au jus from the last brisket. Sometimes, to crisp it up, I will unwrap and let it sit nekkid on the grill for a few minutes, before rewrapping and resting.

I typically cook at 225-250, but a couple of times I've cooked at around 300 and it turned out fine. Just have to wrap at the right time.

The first couple of briskets either turned out flavorful, but dry or it was just roast beef, nothing special. With the procedure described above, it compares with anything I've found in the Atlanta BBQ places.

How long are you letting the brisket rest after you pull it from the smoker? I've noticed a big improvement going from 1 hour to 3-4 hours of rest.

I leave mine wrapped in butcher paper, place in an icechest stuffed with old towels to take up air space. It stays piping hot for hours.

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The scraps of fat you cut off during trimming of the brisket, put in cast iron or something else you don’t mind going in the smoker and render them down during the smoke along with the brisket. Use the juice from that and put that all over your wrapping paper and your brisket at wrapping.

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I did exactly this, now I have a full mason jar with extra rendered beef fat. The moisture level was off the charts on this brisket.

I found that the last brisket I did, I left more fat than I really wanted to make sure I kept moisture level up, but I got a little unwanted fat on the finished product. This one I took the fat down a little further than normal, but it rendered and barked great, and the small amount of extra rendered fat did a great job of keeping everything moist. When I went to slice it I had a good quarter inch of rendered fat in the paper.

This is how I smoke mine and it comes out great. I only do flat cause its just me and my wife (no pics). I have a rectec 700 and an oklahoma joe bronco. If using pellets I like using a mix of lumber jack hickory and lumberjack cherry. I also use a smoke tube. If you dont have one by all means get one. Add a ton of smoke. I dont care what anyone says, it will never be like a stick burner. And for me it takes forever to smoke something on pellet grill vs my oklahoma bronco. That this is by for the most efficient smoker Ive ever used. But sorry for the tangent

I use a light coat of mustard then season with Killer hogs AP or Cosomos Texas Beef. Or make my own with kosher salt, garlic powder and pepper.

Get smoker to temp then throw her on there. Put probe in the thickest part. When it stalls, or shortly after, I wrap in foil but before I wrap, I take some of the same seasoning i used and mix it with water. Make it pretty stout but not overwhelming. I bring the foil up around all the sides then pour that around the brisket then wrap tightly.

I then bring it up to 205. I let it rest for at least an hour in a small cooler with a towwel on the bottom. Thats very important. Take it out and serve. If for some reason its not juicy as frick, take that juice in the bottom and pour over the strips. Most of mine are so juicy its not needed but depending on the meat, it might be very very lean. That just ensures everything.

Brisket quits taking up smoke after about 3 hours. The ring is in and the bark will continue developing while it finishes. Take it off the smoker at three hours, wrap it tightly in foil or butcher paper, and finish in a 350 oven until it hits temp, I usually pull at 203F. Probe it in several places to make sure its done, then cover with a towel or put in ice chest for at least 1 hour. Perfect every time, and usually in less than 8 hours.

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I’ll keep trying different things but don’t want to wrap and lose the nice bark.

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You could just unwrap and smoke it for a little while to bring it back.