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What to do with brisket trimmings
If you’re wondering what to do with your brisket trimmings, you’ve come to the right place.
Usually, a lot of Pitmasters will explain when teaching others how to smoke BBQ, that you absolutely need to begin trimming a brisket.
That means taking a very sharp fillet type knife and promptly start slicing the perimeter of the meat.
This should in theory start to remove a lot of the thicker white fat that you see encompassing very large briskets.
Once the very hard fat trimmings are removed from the piece of BBQ, they can serve as a variety of base ingredients for other side dishes and other meals related to barbecue such as ground beef burgers and sausage links.
Grinding brisket trimmings
As noted above, you can have a variety of applications for your brisket trimmings.
This includes grinding them into what is known as brisket hamburger patties.
These are actually really good and are quite flavorful.
It’s a lot fattier and texture and taste than the usual beef patties you can pick up from a grocery store local to you.
If you wonder what they actually taste like, then consider going to the store and picking some up for yourself to see what you’re getting into.
Otherwise, go ahead and just trim your brisket and use a combination of the trimmed fat in meat to begin grinding them up into some very flavorful meat patties that can be served at a later time.
Making Sausage
Another popular thing to do with your brisket trimmings is to not only grain him up to hamburger patties, but you also use them as the main base for making sausage links.
This can be an excellent way to provide some more protein and fat content into your sausage.
It should taste extremely juicy, and can also be quite cost-effective since you’re essentially recycling and repurposing a portion of your brisket but he did not want originally.
Quite frankly, BBQ is a very cost effective way of eating.
Should you trim your brisket to begin with
This is actually a very polarizing topic.
A lot of people myself included, don’t really think that you need to be trimming your briskets that often.
The reasoning behind that statement is that if you were concerned about some extra hard fat around the perimeter of the brisket, it will just run her off as you start to smoke it throughout the entirety of a 12 hour cook.
On the contrary, many believe that even though you cook it long enough, these pockets of fat around the brisket actually don’t run her down all the way which is why mini suggest trimming at least some portions of the brisket where are you say hard pockets of fat.
Does brisket make good ground beef?
Brisket makes excellent ground beef.
This is because it’s usually made from brisket trimmings, which are often times very fatty and nature.
As a matter of fact I would say most of them are pretty fatty, but that means it will certainly be juicy and melt in your mouth.
You don’t even have to use brisket trimmings to make ground beef.
You can’t even consider slicing portions of your actual meaty brisket and throw that into the grinder as well along with your brisket trimmings.
This will serve to start leaning out and making the profile of the burger a lot more balanced between lean and fatty.
Should you trim brisket before grinding?
If you are considering trimming your brisket before grinding, just be aware that it will most likely be lean in nature just because you are starting to only include the later parts of the meat and not the fattier end cuts.
Final Thoughts
At the end of the day, it’s up to the discretion of the pit-master to trim or not to trim their brisket in the first place.
If you do happen to trim your brisket, there are a variety of use cases that you can start to repurpose the trimmings for.
These include making sausages and hamburger patties. Both of these options are fantastic and taste amazing.
Robert is a certified Pitmaster, with over a decade of experience in smoking the best meats you’ll ever feast upon. He also has a Bachelor of Business Administration from the University of Texas at San Antonio. When he’s not researching technical topics, he’s most likely barbecuing in his backyard.