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Brisket Roll-ups for Lunch at Misty Isle Farms By Bob Lyon
For the past four Septembers, I've been promoting barbecue at the Western Washington Fair in a 90-minute session, including 100 roll-ups during 45 minutes explaining brisket. Two of my helpers have been Chuck Winn, head cook at the Beach Lunch in Tacoma and Keith Watts, owner of C.C. and Company, a construction window firm. Both are competition barbecuers. Chuck takes over the brisket preparation on his Globe slicer. I first got the idea of feeding a crew at a meat packing plant after winning the Bob Roberts Memorial Texas State Brisket contest in Terlingua in November 2000. I'd taken four prime briskets with me from Washington Beef in Toppenish. They'd been sponsors of the Washington State Championship for several years. I film wrapped the four brisket remains, two of them whole, chilled them in my cooler, took them back on the plane to Seattle, and popped them into my freezer. Then I arranged to feed the office crew at the plant for lunch, warming 3-5 pound pieces in their lunchroom microwave and slicing them with my competition blade as 30 employees rotated through, feasting on brisket roll-ups with barbecue sauce. the plant sent out tons of briskets to various markets weekly, but none of them had ever tasted barbecued brisket. A real awakening for them!
In January 2005, I set up a lunch session at the Tukwila plant with two thawed briskets prepped by Chuck, six loaves of white bread, and three bottles of barbecue sauce. Keith, Chuck, and I handled the microwave to bread to sauce anointing for a steady line of hungry meat handlers. They came in from below 40° working conditions, still wearing their required plastic hair nets, for a taste of their own brisket, carefully barbecued by Charley Brank, another NBBQN advertiser. This time I didn't use competition leftovers, but whole briskets off their assembly line in Spokane. Fellow barbecuers, your leftover competition brisket is a treasure. Treat it that way. |
Barbecued brisket has a life of its own after it's frozen. Bring out half of one still wrapped in film, set it on the kitchen counter to thaw unwrapped, and the enticing odor will take over the room after an hour. It's good sliced cold. Sliced and heated in the microwave, two slices with a commercial barbecue sauce on white bread can feed lots of folks and make a cheap lunch seem special. I've had this sandwich in Taylor, TX at the Houston Rodeo competition and at Arthur Bryant's in Kansas City. (At Arthur's, you get a lot more brisket.) Somehow there's a greater penetration of smoke flavor that goes on during the freezing process. When the brisket comes right off the pit and into the sandwich, that's a different story. In more BBQ houses, they've either been chilled and brought back or held warm over a period. 
I save competition brisket leftovers. There's always a time in the following year when they'll come in handy. Mine has recipe is in the KCBS Cookbook. When we had our last house remodeling, I fed the crew on brisket sandwiches twice, having heated a big chunk in the oven at 225° until it was warm and sliced it competition thin (1/8” to 1/4” rather than 3/8” minimum for foil brisket bakers masquerading a barbecuers). 
In 2004, I became acquainted with Misty Isle Farms Angus beef through Gordy's Steak and Smokehouse BBQ in North Bend , subject of at least two of my 2004 NBBQN articles. At the Paul Kirk Pitmaster Class last April, I arranged for him to use the same Misty Isle briskets we'd tasted at Gordy's prior to his becoming an NBBQN advertiser. Paul said they were the best briskets as far as consistent quality that he'd ever used for his classes. We were able to take a plant tour to see just how they prepped their six steak varieties for markets and restaurants daily.
