Caught a pitmaster saying 'let the fire speak' and it fixed my brisket bark

Last weekend I was at a comp in Lockhart and one of the old timers on the next pit was telling his helper to stop flipping the meat so much. He said 'you keep checking on it, you're just letting the heat out. Let the fire speak.' So I backed off from opening my smoker every 45 minutes, only touched it at the 3 hour mark and again at 5. The bark came out way darker and the moisture held, first time I didn't get a dry flat in like 8 cooks. Anyone else notice they get better results when they just leave the lid shut longer? How often do you all actually peek during a long cook?

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leow9012d ago

Everyone peeks way too much and it kills the cook. The fire needs to settle and work, not get interrupted every time you get bored. Same thing happened to me when I finally stopped fussing with my pit, night and day difference.