Two weekends ago we had a group of friends over and smoked a full packer brisket and a pork butt. The butt turned out great, but I thought I lost the brisket. Oddly enough, everyone seemed to love it. I froze what meat was left.

Tomorrow I have a dozen (different) friends coming over and I plan to re-heat the remaining brisket and pork. The meat has fully thawed. I've added a little more jerk seasoning to the pork and more rub to the brisket.

My plan is to:

1. Leave the meat in foil pans
2. Cover the pans with more foil
3. Light the smoker and bring the temp up to 200F
4. Warm the meat for about two hours
5. Rest the meat about thirty minutes and serve

My concern is whether I am going to dry-out the meat, need to consider a lower temperature, or a shorter time interval.

Anyone got any thoughts, or past experience?

The microwave is your friend. You certainly do not need to re-heat the meat for two hours, or you will dry it out. You have less a problem than you think and they will love it.

I hate to microwave it, but I don't mind getting the smoker up to 200F then use my temperature probe to tell me when to quit. Maybe I'll pull the meat when I see the internal temp around 185F or so. I'm not trying to smoke the meat any more than it already is, and I damn sure don't want to dry it out.

Re-heating over low temperature is a good idea, my suggestion is to add some moister to the meat, seal it then re-heat slowly. Use water, chicken or beef stock, beer or whatever you like. Also when you seal the meat in your foil pans, cover them with Saran Wrap first then cover with aluminum foil, that way you have a good seal and the moisture can't escape. As the meat is already cooked all you really want to do is heat it up enough to serve, my rec is stop re-heating when a lower temp is reached, say 120 to 140 degrees. Let us know how it turns out.

As long as it's covered it should be okay. Adding a little moisture - either stock, sauce, beer, whatever can't hurt.

What I normally do is vacuum seal leftovers, freeze and then drop into boiling water (or almost boiling water) to re-heat. Another method that has worked well is to empty the bag into the crock pot and heat it up there. This is probably where I've had my best results.

Microwave does work, too, on the lower power settings with a little moisture added.

Your plan seems solid, Ken, and should work fine. Let us know how it goes!

Jim

I'll go with your 140F recommendation.

Thanks all

The microwave is still your friend whether you know it or not.

I use the microwave a lot, but putting my smoked meats in there seems sacrilegious; other than to warm up a sandwich like last night.

Anyway; the warm-up technique of bringing the smoker up to 200F, pork and brisket covered, one hour, internal temp. around 140F worked perfect. (They particularly jumped all over the (mild) Jamaican Jerk pulled-pork.)

If I had anything to do-over I would not have added more rub to the brisket for the warm-up. I think it was over-kill. (I have this problem that if a little bit of anything is good; more must be better.)

We've got more guests over today, so we'll be eating left-overs, and that should wipe-out what remains.

Thanks for the ideas.

best way to reheat bbq, is to vacume pack it , freeze it, and when ready to thaw, sous vide to 150