Texas oven roasted beef brisket

Like many people I guess, I like watching 'Man vs food'.  It's not the challenge I enjoy but the restaurants he visits in the first part of the show and all that amazing American barbecued food.  Unlike here in England where barbecue means searing with heat over hot charcoal in the garden in the USA it means cooking long and slow, often with smoke.  One of the meats that is often featured is beef brisket which I have never tried so I went looking for a recipe.  Brisket is not an expensive cut of beef and it is very lean.  It requires long slow cooking to get the best from it.  I picked up a 2lb joint from Tesco that fed four of us four six quid.  That makes it a realistic joint to cook.  I found this recipe on the Food Network and have modified it to suit this size of joint. 

 

TEXAS OVEN-ROASTED BEEF BRISKET

 

 

• 2lb beef brisket
• 1 tbsp. chilli powder
• 1 tbsp. salt
• 1/2 tbsp. garlic powder
• 1/2 tbsp. onion powder
• 1/2 tbsp. ground black pepper
• 1/2 tbsp. sugar ( I always use brown for the flavour)
• 1 tsp. mustard powder
• 3/4 pint of beef stock (one reviewer had tried beer and recommended it)

 

Make a dry spice rub with all the dry ingredients.  Don't worry if you haven't got them all, experiment.  I'm trying it next weekend with mild chilli powder and substituting cinnamon for the mustard because my daughter in law has a delicate stomach.

Season the brisket on all the exposed sides. 

The original recipe said to cook it straight away but I let it sit overnight to absorb the flavours then let it come back to room temperature to cook

 

 

Preheat the oven to Gas 4/350F/180C

 

Cook in a roasting tray uncovered for an hour then turn the oven down to Gas 2/300F/150C

and add the stock to a depth of about 1/2 an inch.

 

Seal it up tightly with a lid of a couple of layers of foil and return to the oven for three hours or until it is fork tender.  Cut it thinly across the grain with a sharp knife and serve with the juices.  
It makes a lot of juice and it was chilli hot.  Next time I am going to thicken it up in a pan to make a gravy and add some tomato puree to take a little of the bite out of it.

 

And here it is on the plate with lazy rice (out of a packet!)