Saving Brisket Trimmings for Grinding

I'm a pretty aggressive brisket trimmer, I remove most of the fat between the point and flat, the hard fat pockets on either side of the point, and at least trim it down to 1/4" all over. I don't really keep or grind any of the hard fat unless it's still attached to the red meat below it. I trim the actual meat off anywhere that it looks like it'd affect aerodynamics or where it might be dangly or thin and prone to overcooking or burning. on a 15lb brisket I usually have 3-4 lbs of fat I just throw away, and maybe a pound or slightly more of grindable meat. Sometimes the brisket flat will be thinner than it appears in the packaging so I'll just take off a couple inches from the end, I'll often time s cut off 1/4-1/2" from either side of the flat two when shaping it.

I probably wouldn't buy a grinder solely for a pound or two of meat every 4-6 weeks, but there are lots of other ways to use scraps as well that might make it a worthwhile endeavor. I debone spare rib tips and trimming spares down to St Louis trim style, usually get about 3lbs of ground pork per 2-pack of spares. You can obviously grind all sorts of other trimmings or whole cuts like chuck roast and it's way better than store bought :thumb:

I've been keeping the brisket trimmings. I keep them in their whole components until ready to grind in the freezer. When you get enough to make some burgers do a roughly 80/20 mix.

I've also been planning to do a confit with a bunch of the leftover brisket fat as well. Saw somebody do chuck burnt ends finished in brisket beef tallow.

If you happen to have a kitchen aid mixer the grinder adapter works well.

If your are going to get a kitchen aid attachment, I would recommend looking for an all metal option. The one made by kitchen aid has plastic housing which kind of sucks.

If I can score a cheap brisket, I’ll just grind the whole thing into burger.