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Why is my smoked brisket rubbery
Having a smoked brisket that is rubbery is no fun experience.
You can’t really eat it, and it can cause quite a bit of frustration because you just spent several hours cooking a large piece of meat.
The reason why your brisket is rubbery is because it is severely undercooked. The rubbery nature comes from the interconnecting tissues and collagen that have not been rendered down properly.
If you don’t let those tissues render down, then the meat will still be very tough and rubbery, producing a piece of meat or barbecue that is frankly inedible.
Why did my smoked brisket turn out rubbery?
Your brisket more than likely came out rubbery because you pulled it off the smoker at too low of an internal Temperature.
You only should be pulling a brisket off the smoker once it reaches an internal temperature of around 200 degrees Fahrenheit.
Anything lower than that, and the connective tissues in the fiber within the brisket itself, will not render down completely.
Not having your connective tissues render down will present a very rubbery type of BBQ.
You really don’t want a piece of barbecue that is rubbery in nature.
Now that we’ve identified why your brisket may have come out that way, let’s take a quick look at how you can potentially fix a rubbery brisket, or better yet, prevent one from happening in the first place.
How do you fix a rubbery brisket?
You can fix a rubbery brisket by simply throwing it back onto the smoker for a little bit longer.
This is to let the internal temperature of your meat come up quite a bit, and then render down all of the collagen and connective tissues.
Specifically, you want the internal temperature to reach above 200 degrees Fahrenheit. That is basically the point at which a brisket stops becoming rubbery and will make incredibly tender and moist pieces of barbecue thereafter.
Does brisket get more tender the longer you cook it?
Briskets definitely get tender the longer you cook them.
Not only that, but if you happen to have a rubbery brisket that may have become way undercooked, it is actually recommended to begin cooking them even more.
You want the meat within the barbecue to completely render down.
That is basically what cooking for long periods of time does to the barbecue.
Despite that, you don’t want to risk overcooking it as well. You can certainly overcook any piece of meat, especially a brisket.
Final Thoughts
If you have gone to the Great Lengths of smoking a brisket, the last thing you want is a rubbery piece of barbecue. That basically means that if you do have that, then you have certainly undercooked it.
What you’ll want to do in that instance, is to throw it back on to the smoker, or perhaps put it in the oven for further cooking.
You want all of the collagen and connective tissues to begin rendering down completely.
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.