Live Kobe/Wagyu Brisketblogging!

(note: this will be cross-posted at the 5-step site here)

So those of you who subscribe to David Rosengarten's The Rosengarten Report will remember the quality time you spent alone fantasizing with the Kobe/Wagyu issue a month or two back. (Oh my god, a sexual metaphor in food writing, someone alert Harper's so they can educate us yokels!)

David Rosengarten wrote:Brisket's brisket, right? Wrong! Wagyu brisket is fully worth the extra shekels you'll pay, because the heightened marbling guarantees that you'll get a juicier, richer finished product. But does the fat hold up after 5 hours of cooking, you ask? Amazingly, it does; I know not why, but a lot of it stays right where it is, inside the meat. The BBQ sandwiches I made... brought tears to the eyes of all who tasted them; I can't think of lusher, more emotional food than this!

Through my connections as an associate of the Hash Brown Institute, the American Society for the Advancement of Portion Size and The Coalition of the Marbling, I was able to go in on a purchase of fresh Kobe/Wagyu briskets which was made in sufficient quantity to bring the cost down to around $4 per pound, with shipping. That results in a brisket which costs about twice as much as the standard one I pick up at one of GWiv's Lake Street connections, yet about one-third what a comparable brisket would cost retail. In other words, $44. Look at this marbling and that seems quite the steal:



That shot should give Harper's enough to go on for a week. As other folks who got one or more of these will be cooking them in the next week, I thought it would be a good idea to post as I cook and possibly help others learn from whatever experience I glean. My basic cooking method, of course, is based on the instructions given at the 5-Step WSM site. As it's a coldish day I decided to use the sand instead of water in the water pan, and reduced my expected cooking time to probably around 7 hours (the other time I cooked a brisket using sand it was done at 7, maybe even overdone).

So I started up the fire about 9:15 and prepped the brisket with mustard and rub. (One thing I noticed as I used up the last of the French's and opened a bottle of Whole Foods' mustard was that the Whole Foods had much less pungency in its smell. Maybe it was kind of old, up there on the shelf, or maybe they don't season it up as strong for some spurious health-related reason. Anyway, I wound up scraping the last of the French's out of the old squeeze bottle instead to get the real taste of cheap mustard.)

9:45, on the smoker:



10:15, closed two vents by 1/3 to keep temperature from getting too high.

to be continued...

Cool!

I've chatted with some other foodies pretty intensively on the idea of "quality", especially as it effects products like brisket. I am very keen to see how this goes.

A while back, there was some discussion of having Honey 1 smoke several varieties of ribs to see how that fared. Too bad that never panned out.

Looking forward to the results.

Rob

Vital Information wrote:Cool!

I've chatted with some other foodies pretty intensively on the idea of "quality", especially as it effects products like brisket. I am very keen to see how this goes.

Rob,

Of course quality affects taste. Pork (basically) hand raised by my friend Bob in Ga has depth of flavor mass market/industrial pork can never hope to achieve. Prime brisket, of which I smoked a few, including a couple of aged prime briskets, offer the same taste differential prime/choice/standard as more common cuts such as steak.

I've not cooked, though I currently have one in the frig and one in the freezer, wagyu brisket, but I've had the pleasure of eating a wagyu brisket that was smoked on a WSM a month or two ago. The wagyu brisket had a full beef flavor, and was quite rich tasting, due to the greater amount of intermuscular fat.

Vital Information wrote:A while back, there was some discussion of having Honey 1 smoke several varieties of ribs to see how that fared. Too bad that never panned out.

I don't think anyone would disagree there is a difference between industrial/feed-lot pork ribs and small quality producer pork. And, if they did, I would simply refer them to Mark Kaminsky's Pig Perfect.

Enjoy,
Gary

Mike G wrote:9:45, on the smoker:
<snip>
to be continued...

Mike,

Only 9:45 and already you've filled the days quota of Gastroporn.

Looking good, real good!

Enjoy,
Gary

Vital Information wrote:Cool!

I've chatted with some other foodies pretty intensively on the idea of "quality", especially as it effects products like brisket. I am very keen to see how this goes.

A while back, there was some discussion of having Honey 1 smoke several varieties of ribs to see how that fared. Too bad that never panned out.

Looking forward to the results.

Rob

Rob,

Your taste buds should all ready have answered this question. The pork served at Gary's in June is an example.

I didn't take Rob's comment to mean he wonders if you can tell the difference between Wagyu brisket and Jewel select brisket. Of course you can.

I understood him more to mean, how much of certain dishes/items identity is bound to their historical place as humble cuts. While I would happily dine on nothing but Prime steaks from here on out, could I afford such a luxury, would there be a certain "quality" lost if, say, Kreuz Market and Smitty's and Luling, et al. all switched to ultrapremium beef? Isn't there a sense in which we like eating the "regular" stuff? Even with hamburgers...sure, a Wagyu burger is a treat, but do I really like it better than a more traditional burger. I don't know...

Of course, Rob's never needed anyone to speak for him...

Bruce wrote:
Rob,

Your taste buds should all ready have answered this question. The pork served at Gary's in June is an example.

But Bruce, that's the only pulled pork you've ever made for me, how do I know they all aren't that good.

And going forward, I DO prefer Aaron speak for me because a lot of people think of me as a loon, while everyone considers Aaron the most reasonable person they know.

Well, one issue of course is that what's quality in one meat may not be quality in another cut; BBQ was developed as a way of cooking "low-quality" meats (seen as such because they have a lot of cartilage, gristle etc.) and turning their structure to advantage. The person who sees leanness as a sign of quality is going to be horrified by a regular brisket with its glacier-like fat cap and doubly so by this one's marbling, but that's because they don't get the point of the cut and the cooking method. (Point--get it?)

Rosengarten, as he goes cut by cut through what's available in Kobe/wagyu by mail order, finds some things where the fat and flavor enhances what you traditionally do with a cut, and some where it wasn't worth the money, such as strip steak and hot dogs (!).

Anyway, time for the 3-hour flip. Before...



Flip!

Mike,

Looks great!!!

From what I remember, the Wagyu brisket seemed to feel done sooner than the standard brisket. As skeptics and amateurs, we went against our better judgement and let it go a little longer. And although I think that we might have left it on a bit too long, the marbling kept it moist.

tp

Yeah, Trixie-Pea, at the six hour flip it was almost there. I think it's coming off at six and a half which will be as soon as I finish this post (it's 4:13, despite what the post time says).

Here's how it looked at the flip:

Oh man that looks good!

Mike,

I am watching this event from Phoenix, agonizing over the fact that I have one of those briskets waiting for my return and it will be nearly a week before I can cook it and eat it. I hope this post makes it through because the drool seems to be shorting out my keyboard.

Glad to know that people are actually following this saga as it unfolds...



Did I mention that there's some fat on this brisket?

Besides the fact that it positively oozes grease every time you touch it, there's absolute wads of the stuff in between the point and the flat. You can tell, though, that it's good quality fat-- it's pinkish white instead of the usual gray you find in briskets, and it's silky smooth, like leaf lard. Slicing between the two pieces was like cutting butter.



The flat looks absolutely gorgeous. I'm a little more concerned about the point, which is fattier anyway on a normal brisket, but on this one I kept slicing away layers of fat and finally I got to strands of meat still encased in fat. Will it be too rich to eat? Very possibly, but at least the flat should be wonderful.

Here's a side dish I often make with BBQ-- cube potatoes and yams, toss with olive oil, onion, and seasonings like herbes de Provence, seal in a foil pouch and throw on the lower rack while everything else cooks. Simple and delicious.

Afterglow

Well, it was much like I thought it would be after separating it.

The flat was superb. Brisket's roast beefiness with a silkier mouthfeel, luxurious but recognizably beef taste and texture, sandwich beef. A saturated beef flavor, like it had simmered in beef stock. Which in a sense, it had.



The point was over the top. Little nuggets of meat surrounded by a web of fat. Like brisket foie gras. Myles picked his out of his sandwich and started to complain about it being weird (it didn't help that the piece had a big visible vein). And that was from the meatier end. The way to eat the point was to bury it inside a sandwich made up mainly of flat and let its fatty luxuriousness lubricate and permeate the whole sandwich, like mayo.

One thing to note-- like JeffB said about Barbara Ann's hot links, there's a lot of Flavolipids going to the angels. In other words, I'd say I got about a quarter less meat out of it than the same size non-Kobe brisket would have yielded. All that fat riddled throughout has to weigh something. But complaining about weight lost to that would be like complaining about the amount of your sturgeon that's wasted in roe.

Would I spend the money and the time again? Not every time, but yes. It is too rich to eat frequently, part of the point of BBQ, like burgers, like so many things, is its honest plainness. Like Aaron said, there's a quality that's lost if you only have the finest cuts; some of these dishes and techniques exist to show what can be done with humble foods. But to wow somebody with my BBQ prowess, to remind myself once a year (or twice...) what it was like, to have something to dream about and aspire to, sure.



KBA Brisket from
Arrowhead Game Meats
P.O. Box 439
Kearney, MO 64060
816-628-2099
www.gamemeat.com

I enjoyed following this. Unfortunately, I didn't get a piece at the end of all the drooling.

A

Vital Information wrote:I've chatted with some other foodies pretty intensively on the idea of "quality", especially as it effects products like brisket. I am very keen to see how this goes.

Aaron Deacon wrote:I didn't take Rob's comment to mean he wonders if you can tell the difference between Wagyu brisket and Jewel select brisket. Of course you can.

Aaron,

Rob said he chatted about quality, which I took to mean how does quality affects taste/flavor.

Aaron Deacon wrote:While I would happily dine on nothing but Prime steaks from here on out, could I afford such a luxury, would there be a certain "quality" lost if, say, Kreuz Market and Smitty's and Luling, et al. all switched to ultrapremium beef?

Aaron, I don't think there's much chance of kobe/wagyu replacing select or choice brisket as the BBQ meat of choice. Not only is access limited, but it's cost prohibitive for both restaurant and consumer, aside from a once in a great while treat.

I once had wagyu bone-in prime rib at Gibson's, a huge (huge) hunk of incredibly marbled beef. Looked like an advertisement for nothing says excess like excess, I was overloaded by the rich beef after the fourth bite.

Vital Information wrote:And going forward, I DO prefer Aaron speak for me because a lot of people think of me as a loon

Vital Information wrote:while everyone considers Aaron the most reasonable person they know.

Aaron is most certainly a reasonable person, but I still don't see the point under discussion, if not taste/flavor differential. That there is a tangible difference, at least to me, seems quite obvious.

I've had limited experience smoking both prime and dry-age prime brisket. Prime brisket, as with wagyu, cooks slightly faster due to the greater internal marbling and, especially for the novice, gives a wider margin of error for overcooking/drying out.

Enjoy,
Gary

Mike G wrote:Glad to know that people are actually following this saga as it unfolds...

Mike,

Are you kidding? You are responsible for at least a dozen shorted out keyboards.

Mike G wrote:The flat looks absolutely gorgeous. I'm a little more concerned about the point, which is fattier anyway on a normal brisket, but on this one I kept slicing away layers of fat and finally I got to strands of meat still encased in fat. Will it be too rich to eat? Very possibly, but at least the flat should be wonderful.

Next time out consider splitting the point in half, hitting it with a fairly spicy dry rub and putting it back on the smoker for an hour or two. Burnt ends from Wagyu brisket. Now that's what I'm talking about!

Strands of meat encased in fat, from the wagyu point, is a perfect description.

Waygu smoked by Pigmon and Trixie-Pea


Exceptionally nice pictorial/tutorial.

Enjoy,
Gary

G Wiv wrote:I still don't see the point under discussion, if not taste/flavor differential. That there is a tangible difference, at least to me, seems quite obvious.

I think taste/flavor differential is a given. To me, the point under discussion is the issue of how you define the "quality" of one item versus another. Is comparing a Wagyu brisket to a brisket from Peoria like comparing apples and oranges, or oranges and tangelos (to borrow a phrase), or oranges and oranges. I'm inclined not to vote for the latter.

When I think quality bread, I would choose a Fox and Obel baguette over a Jewel baguette every time. Fox and Obel produces a better baguette, a baguette of higher quality, in just about every way I can think of. I'm not so sure I'd make the same argument for Wagyu ground beef.

G Wiv wrote:I don't think there's much chance of kobe/wagyu replacing select or choice brisket as the BBQ meat of choice.

Of course not. But hypothetically, would you want it to? I think that is at the crux of the "quality" question. Do you think one is of better quality than the other, or do you think they are simply different products for different occasions?

It looks awesome, but I'm wondering about the taste of the meat. Beyond fat flavor and smoke flavor, did it really have as much beef flavor as regular brisket? I'm finding that hard to believe.

I've had the opportunity to taste real Kobe in Japan and I have to say I didn't like it nearly as much as American beef. It was meltingly tender, almost unctuous, but its taste was bland and one-dimensional. To me, it didn't have anything like the depth of flavor, the beefiness, that aged, corn-fed American meat has.

I've also had the Wagyu sold by Allen Brothers. It had somewhat more flavor albeit a bit less tenderness (the U.S. cattle are fed a different diet and get more exercise than the Kobe cows), but I still would rather have a traditional steak. (And I definitely agree with Rosengarten about the Wagyu hot dog.)

How this translates to a brisket, I don't know. It certainly seems like smoking is just about the only thing a Wagyu brisket would be good for. You wouldn't want to make corned beef or pot roast out of one. (Imagine what a cholent made from such a fatty piece of meat would be like! Oy, such a heartburn....)

It's a good question, LAZ, but one that will take me until later today to answer. As GWiv has pointed out before, the act of smoking meat tends to fill the cook's nostrils, clothes etc. with smoke and thus deaden you somewhat to the taste of what you cooked; unless you have the leisure to take a shower in between taking it off the fire and eating it, you don't taste it as fully as you will the next day.

I think once again we're back to that point of whether, with certain cuts, cheapness and plainness are part of what we like. (The most obvous case is a good bar burger made of steak versus a 30s style burger like Bill's; the leaner ground steak simply behaves differently in many ways than the thin, cheaper patty, and you lose as well as gain something.) To the extent that I did taste it last night, I found it rich, saturated-beef flavor, and of course a smoky flavor, but not in a way that simply dialed up what brisket is like and scored an 8 where other briskets score a 5 or 6; it was different from other briskets, not just more or better of the same. Maybe later today I can be a little less vague about why.

P.S. Okay, I just tried some of both pieces again and while maybe I could detect some note that's missing in the wagyu brisket side by side with a standard one, the overwhelming impression as I eat it is simply of a brisket that's deeper in flavor, more velvety in texture, more richly smoky and beefy and not just dried out-- indeed a brisket dialed up a few more notches, contrary to my earlier comments. It's pretty damn wonderful, frankly. Maybe I will have to make another one of these sooner than I said.

G Wiv wrote:I don't think there's much chance of kobe/wagyu replacing select or choice brisket as the BBQ meat of choice.

Aaron Deacon wrote:Of course not. But hypothetically, would you want it to? I think that is at the crux of the "quality" question. Do you think one is of better quality than the other, or do you think they are simply different products for different occasions?

Aaron,

I would not want to eat wagyu brisket on a weekly basis, much as I would not want, even if I could afford to, eat at Avenue's/Alinea etc. on a weekly basis. It's simply too rich, in a foie gras/heavy cream way, to consume often. Do I think a wagyu brisket is the same product as a standard/choice/prime brisket, yes, absolutely, in the same way economy/4-door sedan/SUV/Lamborghini are all cars.

If my response seems vague/not to point, it's because I don't, and may never, completely understand the question at hand.

As I have a lovely, well marbled, wagyu brisket in my refrigerator, which I am not going to be able to smoke on my WSM today, as I had hoped, I'm going to drop it off at Honey 1, where Robert Sr. has kindly agreed to smoke it for our pre Windy City Roller repast Sunday. Wagyu brisket, along with Honey 1's delicious tips, links and spare ribs should make for a heck of a pre bout meal.

Enjoy,
Gary

G Wiv wrote: I'm going to drop it off at Honey 1, where Robert Sr. has kindly agreed to smoke it for our pre Windy City Roller repast Sunday.

LTH,

I prepped the wagyu and brought it to Honey 1, the wagyu are really quite beautifully marbled.


With brisket I like a slightly heavy rub, something about salty, spicy, slightly charred crispy beef fat that really floats my boat.


I combined dropping off the wagyu with meeting my wife for lunch and, even though Honey 1 was quite busy, it was only a 10-minute wait for our order, which was spot-on.

I ran into a few people I know, including a friend of Rene G's who just made the LTH jump from serious lurker to registered user. Welcome Akebono

I'll post a few pics from tomorrows wagyu at Honey 1.

Enjoy,
Gary

I took my turn in the wagyu sweepsteaks yesterday. All I can say is that it was wagyulicious tm. Cooking this brisket was somewhat different than cooking a normal brisket; almost like cooking a different cut of meat. The high fat content and marbeling makes this a very forgiving peice of meat. Luckily I diodn't have to put that forgiveness to the test.

Wagyulicious tm Brisket (and sausage friend)


I served it along with (among other things) some baked beans made with bacon, onions and 5 types of peppers that cooked beneath the brisket for several hours.

Wagyu Baked Beans

So I'm preparing to make my BBQ waygu brisket on Saturday (sand, check, lump charcoal, check, hickory, check), then I read the weather page and I see that it might RAIN on Saturday. Now, I know that a WSM can smoke just fine in a moderate rain, but I'm less than thrilled about starting and maintaining a fire in a cold winter drizzle (also, I'm guessing the constantly water-cooled jacket is going to derange projected cooking times). Plus, an oven is easier to control and I'm a lazy S.O.B., etc.

So my query, and it may be blasphemy, is would it be be insane to bake this brisket (low and slow, to be sure, but without the rub and smoky flavor)? It would be a different animal, no doubt, than it's BBQ cousin, but could it be an animal we might love?

Hammond

David!

I've been waiting for someone to attempt a non-smoked preparation of their Wagyu Brisket. While, I myself have not yet been able to bring myself to try it--the two preparations that I have considered are Red Wine Braised (think variation on beef Bourguignon), or the Ultimate Pot au Feu. I think that the latter would be an incredible holiday meal. Of course you probably wouldn't use the whole thing (half sounds about right) for the P.O.F. (unless you're making a massive batch), rather you'd want to use a big portion of it, in addition to other meaty flavorings like a whole chicken, and some marrow bones.

But Pot au Feu is such a great celebration meal--you serve the broth, then the sliced meats and vegetables with great garnishes...cornichons, horseradish, mustards, and crusty bread. Plus it's fairly simple to prepare, and once everything is prepped and in the pot, all you need to worry about is what kind of wine to uncork.

trixie-pea wrote:But Pot au Feu is such a great celebration meal--you serve the broth, then the sliced meats and vegetables with great garnishes...cornichons, horseradish, mustards, and crusty bread. Plus it's fairly simple to prepare, and once everything is prepped and in the pot, all you need to worry about is what kind of wine to uncork.

Hey Trixie,

That sounds like a definite possibility -- I like the idea of having pickles, etc., on the side, too, so that each person can personalize their pot. I probably would, however, make the whole damn thing (otherwise, I've got half-a-defrosted-brisket to contend with).

Thanks for the advice...we'll see what happens (I may still smoke it if the weather looks good),

David

David Hammond wrote:So I'm preparing to make my BBQ waygu brisket on Saturday (sand, check, lump charcoal, check, hickory, check), then I read the weather page and I see that it might RAIN on Saturday. Now, I know that a WSM can smoke just fine in a moderate rain, but I'm less than thrilled about starting and maintaining a fire in a cold winter drizzle (also, I'm guessing the constantly water-cooled jacket is going to derange projected cooking times). Plus, an oven is easier to control and I'm a lazy S.O.B., etc.

So my query, and it may be blasphemy, is would it be be insane to bake this brisket (low and slow, to be sure, but without the rub and smoky flavor)? It would be a different animal, no doubt, than it's BBQ cousin, but could it be an animal we might love?

Hammond

Grind it up for hamburger, wuss.

David Hammond wrote:So my query, and it may be blasphemy, is would it be be insane to bake this brisket (low and slow, to be sure, but without the rub and smoky flavor)? It would be a different animal, no doubt, than it's BBQ cousin, but could it be an animal we might love?

I weep

Bruce wrote:Grind it up for hamburger, wuss.

I was fully prepared to take pipe for this suggestion, and I just got off the phone with a very concerned stevez who (in only a slightly admonitory tone) suggested that oven braising/roasting would be a bad plan indeed. So, put down your arms, it looks like the BBQ will be it. I don’t know what came over me.

Hammond

David Hammond wrote:So, put down your arms, it looks like the BBQ will be it. I don’t know what came over me.

Curses.

I wrote:I've been waiting for someone to attempt a non-smoked preparation of their Wagyu Brisket.

I guess it's up to me. If I can get PIGMON to release one of the briskets he's been hording, I think I will have to take my own advice. Pot au Feu, is one of the most rewarding meals to prepare, present, and eat. Why not w/ Wagyu?

Seriously, anyone have any reasons why Wagyu wouldn't be a good way to go in this preparation?