Recipe: Slow Cooker BBQ Beef Brisket

I’m going to let you in on a little secret.

The slow cooker is your friend.

For those that already know this, awesomeness!

For the rest of you, what are you waiting for?

If it’s the beast that mine is, I know it’s a pain to lug it out of the cabinet.

To clean up the pot after you’re done using it.

Especially if you have to configure your other dishwasher contents to not only make sure it fits, but also that it gets clean.

Something I usually leave to Mystic because he loads the darn dishwasher like nobody’s business.

Mostly because he thinks about the sprayer, the water, how things are tilted and positioned.  When he loads the dishwasher and it gets emptied, it looks like this:

Everything gets clean.

When I load it?  A totally different story.  I don’t put all that thought into it.  I put things where there’s space.  Period.  End of story.

But I digress.

Every time I think “slow cooker,” I think of Ron Popeil’s popular saying “Set it and forget it.”  Of course he’s talking about his fancy rotisserie cooker thing.  That none of us needs.  But it’s still the basic concept.

Put a bunch of ingredients into your slow cooker.

Go to work.

Forget about it.

Work all day.

Come home tired, spent, and ready to occupy the middle cushion of your couch and watch the newest episode of fill-in-your-blank favorite show.

Open your front door and exclaim, “What IS that smell?  It smells delicious.”

Oh right.  That’s YOUR DINNER.  That’s all done.  As soon as you walk in the door.

Is it any wonder that the O’Malley slow cooker is in service at least once a week?

I should probably use it even more than once a week.  Eventually I’ll work up to that, but for the past six months or so, I’ve been keeping good with my once-a-week commitment.

A few years ago, my Mom did some research and found out that the best slow cooker on the market was this one by Hamilton Beach.  Hers?  Still in the box.  Maybe this post will shame inspire her into finally unpacking it.

Last week while I was at work?  The slow cooker was working too.  On a delicious BBQ Beef Brisket.  A new recipe I snagged off Sarah’s site.  I made the recipe once and got two dinners out of it.  The first time, it fed two adults, two kids and I used the brisket in sandwiches and served it with grilled vegetables on the side.  The second time, I served it alongside mashed potatoes, a salad, and one other thing that has since escaped me.  That time it took care of four adults.  One of them being Mystic, whose appetite knows no bounds.  The brisket turned out beautifully moist and packed full of flavor.

He is also trying to blame me for a weight gain of 9 pounds.  A blame I am most certainly trying my best to dodge.

I made the recipe exactly as written, but did find that my meat definitely took the full five hours on high to be tender enough.

Go rummage around your kitchen and dig out your slow cooker.

Dust it off.

And start letting it do some of the work for you.

After you’ve given this brisket from Sarah a try, continue the slow cooker trend and make these teriyaki sandwiches, the kids’ favorite version of Cuban Black Beans, or even this Split Pea Soup (that I am totally making this week, super yum!).  Go get ’em!

PS Photo credit to Sarah ’cause we ate all our brisket before I remembered to grab a snap!