Texas Beef Brisket New Mexico-Style
New Mexico Chiles are the dried form of the Red Anaheim Pepper. This chile has a thin flesh with an earthy chile flavor and undertones of wild cherries. This chile ranges from 2 – 4 on a heat scale of 1 to 10. The New Mexico Chile may be referred to as the California Chile or Chile Colorado. New Mexico Chiles are commonly used in Red Mexican or Southwestern sauces and is grown in Mexico. This mildly hot chile. Scoville heat units 8,000 – 12,000.
Suggested Use:
New Mexico Chiles are mildly hot and very popular in Southwest cooking. Great in sauces, salsa, rice dishes, stews and soups. Add directly to the cooking liquid along with other spices. Use in stir fry, or add to chicken or fish marinades.
Ingredients:
Brisket:
9-10 pound brisket (“packer trimmed” preferred)
1/2 cup lemon juice
2 cups red New Mexican chile powder (grind dried chiles in coffee or spice grinder)
1 Tbsp. ground cayenne chile
2 Tbsp. freshly ground black pepper
1/4 cup garlic powder
Brisket Basting Sauce (recipe follows)
Sauce:
2 Tbsp. commercial chile powder
1/2 tsp. ground cayenne chile
1 pound butter or margarine
2 onions, chopped fine
5 cloves garlic, minced
1-1/2 cups beer, such as Shiner Bock
4 lemons, quartered
1 bunch parsley tops, minced
2 cups vegetable oil
1/4 cup Worcestershire sauce
2 bay leaves
Instructions:
Thoroughly coat all the surfaces of the brisket with the lemon juice and rub it in well. Combine the chile powder, cayenne, black pepper and garlic powder in a bowl, and sprinkle generously all over the brisket, rubbing it in well. Make sure that the brisket is entirely covered. Allow the brisket to marinate for at least an hour before smoking.
To smoke the brisket:
Build a hardwood fire in the fire box using pecan, oak, or any fruit wood. When the fire is smoking nicely, place the brisket on the rack fat side up, to let gravity and nature do the basting. Place the breast as far from the heat source as possible, and close the smoker. During the smoking, do nothing to the brisket. The smoking will take approximately 8 hours at 200F smoke temperature. This means a lot of beer will be consumed while you wait and tend the fire.
After the brisket has finished smoking, remove it from the smoker and slather it generously with Brisket Basting Sauce, wrap it tightly in aluminum foil, and return it to the smoker. Close off all of the air supplies to the fire, and allow the meat to “set” in the pit for about 2 hours.
For the sauce:
In a pot, melt the butter and add the onions and garlic. Saute for 4-5 minutes to soften. Add the beer and squeeze in the lemon juice, then add the lemon rinds to the pot. When the foam subsides add all of the remaining ingredients and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to a medium low and simmer for 20 minutes.
Yield: A 10-pound brisket will yield about 10 to 20 servings, depending on the individual brisket and the size of the appetites of the guests.
Recipe by Dave DeWitt and Nancy Gerlach.