There are lots of slightly different ways to prepare and smoke a brisket, and when it comes to pellet grills/smokers I’ll promote any recipe and leave it up to you to decide which approach you wish to follow. For this smoked brisket recipe from Traeger, its a very simple and straightforward approach. What’s notable with this recipe is the deep dark color of the bark that was achieved with the combination of two rubs.
Tap/Click above to watch the recipe or scroll below for the steps: Video – Traeger.com
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Step 1: Starting with a full packer brisket you’re going to have to do a little trimming. You’ll want to get the fat down to around a quarter of an inch all over the brisket.
Step 2: After trimming the fat you’ll also want to trim off any connective tissue and small hanging bits of meat that will burn well before the brisket itself has finished cooking.
Step 3: A part of this recipe that you may not have seen before is to make a small cut at the end of the brisket to mark out the direction of the grain to make it easier to know how to cut against the grain when it comes to time to slice up the finished smoked beef brisket.
Step 4: To develop the exceptional deep dark bark of this brisket, two rubs were used; the first was the Traeger Coffee Rub, which contains Coffee (duh) and Black Pepper.
Step 5: With a large 20lb full-packer brisket such as this, you would need to hit it hard with the rub, a generous liberal application as it can take it being such a large cut of meat.
Step 6: When applying any rub to a beef brisket, you want to make sure to get the ends as well.
Step 7: Also, don’t neglect the sides of the brisket. Otherwise, you won’t get that nice even bark all over.
Step 8: To add even more flavor to the brisket and increase the depth of color on the bark a second rub was applied, in this case the Traeger Prim Rib Rub, which contains Rosemary and Garlic.
Step 9: This is what the brisket looked like after the generous application of both rubs. It was then left to sit at room temperature for up to 45 minutes for the rub to penetrate into the brisket.
Step 10: After leaving the seasoned brisket to sit for 45 minutes it was time to get it on the pellet smoker, but not before inserting the meat probe to monitor its temp. The best BBQ is cooked to temp, not time.
Step 11: The seasoned brisket with its meat probe inserted was then placed on the pre-heated Traeger at a temperature of 225 degrees with the Super Smoke setting in use. For a 20lb brisket such as this, the total cook time will be 10 to 12 hours (including the wrap).
Step 12: When your brisket reaches an internal temperature of 170 degrees after around six hours on the pellet smoker, its time for the wrap, for which you’ll want some large piece of good quality foil, maybe two layers.
Step 13: Ideally, try and use long pieces of foil to keep the seams to a minimum so there are fewer gaps for the humidity to escape and to keep the brisket moist as it continues to cook.
Step 14: When it comes to wrapping the brisket in foil, try and get it as tight as you can. The second cooking stage is broiling/steam cooking the brisket. Therefore you need the foil tight.
Step 15: After tightly wrapping the brisket you’ll want to reinsert your meat probe into the thickist part of the brisket.
Step 16: The foil is going to speed up the cook, its no longer about smoking the brisket, and you’ll want to see the brisket hit a temperature of around 205 degrees before you take it off the pellet smoker.
Step 17: Now, this is what the brisket looked like at the end, but this is not straight out of the pellet smoker, this is after two hours slowly resting in its foil after coming off the pellet smoker at 205 degrees.
Step 18: Following the small cut guide done in Step 3, with a long/sharp knife, you’ll be able to cut against the grain; in this case, they are thin strips that will be used for sandwiches.
Step 19: If you want to test how well you did the bend test is a good guide as to whether the brisket has been properly cooked to tender.
Hi, I’m Chris Scott. I started PelHeat.com back in 2007 and I have a background in pellet manufacturing. PelHeat.com is an educational resource on BBQ pellets, pellet grills & smokers. Check out our Pellet Grill & Smoker Database.
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