What did I do wrong?
The brisket was 18.8 lbs untrimmed (15.05 lbs after trimming). I had a Prime grade cut from Costco.
I have a Weber Searwood 600 XL with Kirkland pellets.
I did an overnight dry brine before the cook. It went on the smoker Thursday at 3pm on the upper rack, fat side up, with water pans underneath. Smoke Boost ran at 180°F for approximately 4 hours before switching to 225°F. The brisket was wrapped in butcher paper with tallow at 9pm when the probe in the flat hit 148°F, then bumped to 240°F post-wrap.
Around 11pm I dropped the temp to 225°F to slow the climb and get some sleep. A deep overnight stall set in from roughly midnight to 4:30am, barely moving from 163°F to 176°F over 5+ hours.
I bumped the temp to 265°F to break the stall. The 265°F ran for approximately 2.5 hours before the probe hit 191°F at 6:30am. The brisket was pulled at 7:15am by feel (80–90% buttery) and held in a pre-warmed cooler for over 5 hours before serving at 12:30pm.
Total cook time was approximately 16.5 hours. The result was a disappointingly dry flat.
This was the worst brisket I ever made.
My previous brisket was a 16 pounder that had 6(!!!) pounds of fat that I trimmed off. I followed the same exact pattern as above and it came out flawless.
Totally confused what went wrong with this cook. What do you think??