Thanks. I learnt the hard way that American chilli powder is not powdered chilli.

Thanks bham. I appreciate your input. It did go down well and I have been enjoying the leftovers. Still a bit peppery though, but homemade bbq steak sauce mellows it right out.  Delicious and still really moist and tender.  I now would have no problem cooking and reheating.  You're possibly not too far away from where the previous owner of my new smoker is now.  His wife told me they are about an hour north from the gulf coast.

I agree that there is nothing wrong with a controlled oven to finish and apparently the Texas BBQ houses use holding ovens where the finished brisket are kept until required for serving, sometimes for long hours.  I'll be investigating this and reconsidering time of day to cook for optimum readiness at meal time.  Wow, some of those offset smokers over your way are amazing.  There's nothing like it here.

I had a very clear and well defined smoke ring all over, with my minimal fat cap but there's plenty of video showing this, even under the fat.  There is always instruction to trim the fat down to only 1/4" thickness all over however.  I'll pay closer attention when I do my next one.  I already have a supermarket piece in the freezer but yesterday I picked up a pair of lamb shoulders so they'll be up next on charcoal for this weekend. I've got a shaker of F. Whitlock & sons Zesty Za'atar rub that I'm keen to try out on some charcoal roasted lamb.

Curry usually goes slow for me in bbq season.

7/10. I have to rate it fairly well as it was good, but I can't go too high as I believe there is room for improvement.  It's either that or I don't know what all the fuss is about. I imagine it is the former, since there is obviously quite a lot to learn and involved in making really good slow cooked / smoked brisket, and there are a lot of very biased opinions about what to do and not to do.  Do this. Don't do this. Do that. Don't do that.

Robbo, I'd be really grateful of your wife's recipe and tips, but here is what I ended up doing after much research.  It worked pretty well for a first attempt, and I made very detailed notes as I went so, I now have a baseline to work from next time.

I went for a "mixed" rub by making a batch of copycat Lawry's seasoning salt, which I applied over the top of 16 mesh black pepper and ground sea salt.  I used a binder / slather of American yellow mustard on the fat cap side only.  The brisket sat on the bench coming to room temperature (mild dry brine) for only about 1 hour.  On the rub I would comment that it was a bit too peppery.  By comparison to the videos I've seen, I didn't use too much so I can only assume that Texas smoked brisket is peppery.  I'll use less next time.

The cook.  I was later starting the fire than I wanted to be by about 3 hours and as it turned out, I needed the extra time.  I ended up finishing the cook in the propane BBQ with the lid down as I couldn't get the smoker temp high enough.  This is apparently ok with some people who finish them in an oven but frowned upon by traditionalists.  Oh well, it worked for me so I'm good with it.  The biggest time issue was that I did well and truly encounter "the stall" and it lasted for just over 2 hours.  All up it took exactly 8 hours to cook from room temperature to the target of 203' F. As it was later than anticipated I was unfortunately only able to give it a short rest.  This is apparently not desirable, but I don't think it did too much damage.

By all accounts this was a very small brisket being a yearling piece of only 2 kg or 4.4 lb.  At a cook time of 1.5 to 2 hours per pound it was about right to take 8 hours. It didn't have enough fat as I foolishly chose one that didn't.  This is wrong and I've learnt that lesson.

I used an ACV / Apple Juice / beer spritz every 45 minutes after the first 45 and wrapped in tallowed and spritzed peach butchers' paper as soon as the meat broke out of the stall.  You can wrap it when the stall starts and push through it faster (the Texas crutch method) but I chose to let it go by itself.

For smoke I used only 2 fairly small pieces of Pecan and 1 small piece of Cherry wood.  This was adequate and there was plenty of smoke flavour, or possibly even too much for the small cut of meat.  It carries a bit of bitterness in aftertaste.  I used the water tray to control temperature and humidity.  The problem with this is that you simply cannot raise the temperature above about 110' C until the water is all gone.  This is great for a long slow controlled cook though.

Anyway, when it was carved it was juicy inside, displayed a clear 1/4" pink smoke ring and had a nice dark bark.  Only one corner went a little dry, but I covered this with foil halfway through, so it wasn't too bad.

Just about everything I did is either recommended or frowned upon, depending upon who you listen to, but it wasn't bad at all, and I look forward to the next one.  The bonus is that I have the bigger model smoker and I was able to do a chicken in it at the same time.  I also finished this in the propane BBQ to crisp up the skin.

That would be greatly appreciated Robbo.  I'll post over in the non-curry section.

I've been watching quite a few videos on smoking brisket and there's a fairly common procedure followed throughout most of them, albeit with some variations.

Unfortunately, my wife has reminded me we have a function to attend tomorrow night so it will be a Sunday cook instead.

It does look good. I've used the powder Santa and I like it. I've never tried the paste so I can't say they are the same, but it is good nonetheless.  I like all the Laziza products I've tried so far which is more than I can say for other "ready to use" masala packets.

You'll appreciate this Robbo.  I couldn't resist the upgrade and bought myself an early Christmas present.  I came upon an advertisement for this.  It's a near new 22" Fornetto Razzo, with loads of additional accessories and nearly Aus $200 worth of lump charcoal, briquettes and smoking wood (Mesquite, Apple, Cherry and Pecan) starter chimney, cover etc.  I simply could not let it pass.  The previous owner is an American who has been out here for 18 years and has just returned home to Alabama. His wife (an Aussie) is tidying up over here before she joins him.

I pretty much paid only the price of the consumables, so everything hardware was essentially free.  I could not believe my luck.  Anyway, I only picked it up today but I've already bought a beef brisket, which I will prepare with a rub tonight, allow it to sit in the fridge for a day, and then light a fire first thing Saturday morning.  I was told that with the large fire basket and properly set, this thing will burn at good temperature for up to 14 hours.  That's a bit different to a tandoor but I can't wait to tuck into a slow cooked Mesquite smoked Brisket.

I have read the Mustard enhances emulsification of olive oil in vinegarette.  Perhaps a sploosh of Coleman's or even wholegrain / seeded will assist.  I like mustard in curry, but it may not suite every dish.

My understanding of "splitting" from what Chewytikka has said:  It is desirable in a good BIR curry that the oil and water have emulsified or become homogenous in texture and remain so upon serving.  When splitting occurs the oil and water become separate again and bleed from the dish, on the plate, and this is usually the result of over-cooking.  This results in what is considered to be a poor BIR curry.  Splitting would in this case be a different thing to simply having excess oil that does not emulsify in the first place and can be spooned off.  I have experienced splitting from over-cooking as opposed to simply having excess oil and it doesn't make for a particularly nice dish.

There is science involved in the nature of solutions, solubility and saturation.  Certain factors will enhance solubility (emulsification) and others will reverse it.

It is common to see the instruction in Base Gravy preparation as the final stage, to continue to simmer until oil separation.  Would this not be similar to splitting, and in this instance a desirable outcome?  It sometimes works for me and other times I give up without separation, but I can't, in all honesty, say it's made much (any) noticeable difference to the curries made from the gravy.

He does, doesn't he Robbo?  He really gets them smoking.

On the chillis, I was able to get "Kashmiri" seeds here in Australia from a seed merchant without too much trouble. Remember that often chilli sold as Kashmiri is actually Byadgi, so include this variety in your search.  If you can buy bags of whole Kashmiri chilli at your Indian Grocer, I had great success growing plenty of plants from 1 particular bag. I germinated over 120 plants with nearly 100% viability, but I only got 1 seedling to germinate out of another brand and a third bag had zero.  I have thousands of seeds out of the good bag, and now of course I have seeds from the plants I grew.

I'll go down and check what brand it was as it's slipped my memory just now.  You may be able to get hold of them over there, otherwise just try as many different ones as you can find.  The bags of whole dried chillies aren't expensive, and you still get to use them after removing the seeds.

The brand probably won't help much since it appears they are packaged by a company here in Sydney. Selco / EPR Food and Spice.