Brisket from Fat Willy's

Winter has decided to take one more swipe at Chicago so on this Sunday having spent my morning on a conference call with a bunch of young whippersnappers and while Sherry had gone out to vent her frustrations in tear down at FreeGeek I decided to seek the Holy Grail of Brisket.

I have begun to write my own personal bus tracker but today the fates were with me.  On this day a week past the Ides of March I ventured out and waited less than two minutes for three of the four buses I rode.  The 80 to Western and the 49 to Schubert each way.

Getting off at Schubert the aroma from a Burger King almost drew me in.  Half a block away though I could see Fat Willy's.  I walked down and passing the alley the next smell I got is that left when a pit is being washed.  Next in view was a door to the kitchen and then finally through the winter protection plastic into the "welcoming" area.  The hostess came and I indicated another party was ahead of me.  She says she has already gotten them.  I told her I would like a pound of brisket and she redirected me to the counter at my right.

At the counter was a young lady on the phone.  She later when asked said her name was Monica.  Waiting, waiting, waiting.  She is off the phone but wait, she has something else to do.  OK, so now she wants to know what she can do for me.  We go through a few cycles of my wanting a pound of brisket and her telling me they do not sell brisket by the pound.  She thinks the order of Only the Meat will be about three quarters of a pound.  She is friendly and pleasant but a pound of brisket is not to be had and Burger King is looking very good.  I have set myself to this task though and will not allow Chicago friendliness or orders not weighed in pounds to keep me from finding you great smoked brisket in Chicago.

I order and she has a problem with the payment system and a server comes to help her.  I engage the server on the topic of by the pound.  It is a bit confusing but it seems that you can get their brisket by the pound catered but it may include sauce which I think is the Au jus from the rubbed beef.  My order was ready though and I was ready to get home with whatever  it was I had ordered and paid for.  There was to be a bit more conversation though as the two upsold me on getting two orders so that I would have a pound and a varity of items were for some reason added to my order.

It turns out those things added were the au jus, mushy onions, creamy horseradish sauce and in a separate brown paper bag the two small containers of BBQ sauce.

On the ride home I got no smell of smoke or BBQ.

Time to open this up and see what I bought.

Now, according to the Check, Please video they marinade their meat over night.  That might account for the smoke ring being so shallow and for the look like maybe the meat was in a pressure cooker.  Never mind though there is a nice rub on the meat and if you dip it in their sauce or do some of the other possibilities with those other thing if you are so inclined you will have a good brisket eating experience.  Just not the one this blog's quest is seeking.

I know that many in Chicago are so inclined and that makes good Texas Style Smoked Brisket hard to find in Chicago.  Brisket is redirected here into corned beef, Italian beef and other kinds of beef I am yet to experience.