Homemade Corned Beef (includes BRINE & PICKLING SPICE MIX)

Cook Time: 1 hour Yield: Makes. 6 big fat ny deli sandwiches

INGREDIENTs

• About 4 pounds of beef brisket

• 1 gallon distilled water

• 8 ounces Morton's kosher salt, by weight (about 7/8 cup)

• 2 teaspoons Prague Powder #1

OPTIONAL INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup brown sugar, preferably dark

• 5 tablespoons pickling spices (See Recipe Below)

• 4 cloves garlic, smashed or pressed

DIRECTIONS

1. About the pickling spices. You can buy them premixed or see below for a recipe for pickling spices that you can make yourself.

2. Find a proper container large enough to handle 1 gallon of brine and the meat as described in my article Science Of Curing Meats. Clean it as described.

3. Mix the cure ingredients and the distilled water. Stir until they dissolve.

4. Take the meat and remove as much fat as possible from the exterior unless you plan to use some of it for pastrami. In that case, leave a 1/8" layer on one side. Because corned beef is cooked in simmering water, the fat just gets gummy and unappetizing. But if you plan to then make pastrami from it, you will be smoking the meat and in that case the fat gets succulent and lubricates the sandwich. I like to buy a full packer brisket and separate the point from the flat, and cut the flat in half when making corned beef or pastrami. That gives me 3 manageable hunks of 2 to 4 pounds each. If you leave the point attached to the flat beneath, it will be very thick and take longer to cure, and there's an ugly hunk of fat between them.

5. Add the meat to the curing solution. It might float, so put a plastic bowl filled with brine on top of the meat until it submerges. The meat will drink up brine so make sure there is enough to cover it by at least 1" or else you'll find the meat high and dry after a few days. Refrigerate. Let it swim for 5 days, up to 7, especially if the meat is more than 2" thick. Move the meat every day or so just to stir up the cure. When you are done, the exterior of the meat will be pale tan or gray and if you cut into it, it should not look too different than normal raw meat, just a little pinker.

6. Now decide which path you want to follow. You can make traditional corned beef and cabbage boiled dinner, you can make corned beef hash, you can make Rockin Reuben Sandwiches, or turn it into Close to Katz's Pastrami.

How to scaling this recipe up

If you want to do a whole packer, I strongly recommend you first remove all surface fat. It inhibits penetration of the cure. You should also separate point and flat and remove the fat from between the layers. Discarding the fat will reduce the weight by as much as 30% and that will shorten the cure significantly. Separating the two muscles will also speed up the process because the thickness has been reduced significantly. For more on scaling read my article on the science of curing and use the curing calculator on that page to determine how much Prague Powder #1 you need and how long it will need to cure.

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PICKLING SPICE MIX RECIPE

Cook Time: 10 minutes Servings: Makes. about 3/4 cup

INGREDIENTS

REQUIRED INGREDIENTS

• 2 tablespoons whole black peppercorns

• 3 inches cinnamon sticks, total length

• 2 tablespoon dill seeds

• 1 tablespoon hot red pepper flakes

• 1 tablespoon mustard seeds, any color

• 1 tablespoon coriander seeds

• 1 tablespoon celery seeds

• 4 bay leaves

• 1 tablespoon dried thyme leaves

• 1 tablespoon ground ginger

• 2 teaspoons whole allspice berries

• 1 teaspoon whole cloves

OPTIONAL INGREDIENTS

• 1 tablespoon mace powder

• 1/2 teaspoon cardamom seeds

• 1 tablespoon juniper berries, smashed

• 2 star anise pods, smashed

DIRECTIONS

1. Put the cinnamon sticks and peppercorns in a plastic bag and smash them with a meat tenderizer or a hammer.

2. Crumble the bay leaves into flakes about 1/8" size.

3. Mix all the ingredients together and store in a tight jar.

Source: from Meathead Goldwin —> amazingribs.com

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