Go to the Recipe: Nine-Day Homemade Corned Beef
Are we able to get ingredients in US/Imperial vs metric?
Note that if you select 1/2 scaling, the amount of meat stays the same, 3 kilos
Watching the video it looks like you removed fat only from the exterior of the brisket, but not any of the thick portion between the two layers of muscle, is this correct? It seems like there's is still a lot of fat left, but I guess after 48 hours a lot of that has just melted away.
Hi Gary, up near the ingredient list, click "Scale recipe" and you can change from grams to ounces. If you are looking for volume measurements instead of masses, you've come to the wrong website.
By "pink salt", I assume you mean curing salt containing sodium nitrite, not that Himalayan stuff?
I have the same question about the pink salt? Is it the Himalayan pink salt?
Question about step # 6. If I do not have a vaccuum sealer should I add any kind of liquid to the brisket inside the bag to proceed to the sous vide water displacement method? If yes, which liquid?
What role does the sugar play in the brine?
Pink salt = sodium nitrite in this case. http://www.amazon.com/Curing-Salt-Instacure-Prague-Powder/dp/B00BBIOJ1G/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1428020652&sr=8-3&keywords=pink+salt+sodium+nitrite
I'm guessing you could then take this and smoke it to make pastrami?
I wonder if you could give it that smoked flavor using liquid smoke in the brine? I live in an apartment in NYC so smoking is impossible but I really love pastrami.
I am starting this project on 12 April with some 4yo Thai French brisket however I intend to give it a 2hr smoking before the bath. Also I usually allow the meats to sit several hours after the brine to redistribute the salt. What do you think?
I have also taken the meat from the brine, smoked it several hours & then dried it to jerky & then ground it to use on Pizza, Spag Bol & Turkish Pride etc, I Keep it frozen in vac bags as the fat can go rancid. This also makes a fantastic reduction with red wine, fish sauce & star anise.
Here in Thailand, I need to travel 255km to Bangkok to buy good beef so I look after it like gold. I use pink curing salt (#1) in all sausage & brine meats & boiled spring water for all brines. It can not be stressed enough to use exact amounts of curing salt for amount of brine & weight of meat.
Keep up the great projects guys, I am perfecting Kefir bread to use with the Ruben.
Cheers, Ed
Flavor.
That's the stuff.
To be precise, Prague Powder #1 aka Insta Cure #1. NOTHING else.
Brine first, THEN smoke. You want the chemical reaction between the cure and the myoglobin in the meat. Smoking first will bollox the myo up. Smoking after = specatacular.
Absolutely. You need a pastrami rub first, mostly coriander and creacked black pepper.
Prague Powder #1 aka Insta Cure #1. NOTHING else. Somebody posted a link above.
Dealer's choice. That's a lot of fat so you can dig it out if you want. Or not.
Gary, a decent kitchen scale can be had from amazon for under $40. You will find weighting ingredients so much easier than volumetric/US measurements for recipes.
Does anyone know where you could buy the pink salt in Europe?
You can't, because the amount of Sodium Nitrite in Prague Powder #1 or a comparable American curing salt is considered too high by EU law. You can use any curing salt you get your hands on in Europe (I got a kg pack from a butcher's supply), but the color (don't know about the taste because I've never had a chance to compare it) will vary, the meat will not become as red.
What does the brown sugar do for the brine? I'm asking because I may be doing a "Whole 30" (Paleo diet type of program) and they don't allow any sugar. So I'd have to omit it from my brine. So I'm curious if I'm going to just lose some of the flavor, or if it will ruin the brine (and if it's a flavor thing, what substitutes can I put in place)?
I ordered Prague #1 from http://www.smokedust.co.uk/ They sell it in 200g packs.
Do the water displacement method -- or clip to the side of the container as I think they indicated. I wouldn't add any sort of liquid for this step -- enough will come out of the brisket.
Having made a bunch of pastrami (and it's cousin Montreal Smoked Meat) -- yes. However, I would highly recommend you give the brisket a few rinses and pat it dry. Then let it air dry in the fridge overnight -- before adding the rub and smoking. 225F for about 4-5 hours until it hits 150. Remove, let cool again overnight. Then make sure to cut the Deckle and flat into it's own -- then steam. Why separate? Deckle takes longer to steam (4 hours) versus flat (2 hours) .. At least it works for me! Oh -- come to think on it. After the brine, I actually do NOT cook it at all in the water .. Just in the smoker. I think that's the main difference between Corned Beef and Pastrami! DOH.
So this seems like a whole packer brisket. Is there any benefit of splitting the Deckle (Round) from the Flat before these steps start? I would think more manageable sized pieces and better penetration of the brine. I do this when I make Montreal Smoked Meat..
I was asking because then it is no longer considered sous-vide if air is in the bag.
Great recipe, thanks! Is it possible to reduce the sous vide cooking time or do it in more menegeable chuncks of time? I am eager to try it, but will definitely not be able to leave it anattended
"Rewrap any leftovers in plastic wrap or a sealed bag and store in the fridge. Use over the next few days—corned beef keeps for about the same amount of time as other deli meats."
Is there any reason you can't freeze leftovers for longer storage?
water displacement method still evacuates the air from the food that is under the water. The pressure from the water acting on the sous-vide bag pushes the air up. As long as the food (and bag) stay down your good. Some guys will weight the bag down with glass marbles (in the the bottom of the bag) to help keep it down.
Hi there, one thing. Even for the salmon mi cuit: I cut the salt a lot. I mean 50% less because i think it really interfere a lot with the flavour. All the commercial brisket I have eaten in USA ( I am italian moved to miami 5 yers ago :-) ) all way too much salty! I love brisket and Pastrami. Also in Salami and sausage home made thata I use to make I cut the salt in some case by 60% respect the american recipes. Instead use little bit more of Instacure some 5% more per Kg. just to feel on the safe side. What do you think?
We've been playing with store bought corned beef. The 140 for 48 yields the most tender and juicy version. However, if you like it with a little more chew go 24hrs. If you like it drier and a little flake, we cook it @180 for 10 hrs. In that one, I strongly recommend chilling it at the end of the cook in an ice bath, once chilled, refrigerate for 8-10 hrs to get the meat to reabsorb the juices. While it is cold, it is perfect for thin slicing.
Good advice. My recipe actually includes a desalination step, soaking in water, before rubbing ands smoking, and then chilling and finally steaming. http://amazingribs.com/recipes/beef/close_to_katzs_home_made_pastrami.html
OK this might be semantics, but if i recall correctly you prefer short ribs way over brisket for pastrami. Since the difference between corned and pastrami is the smoking step (correct me if I'm wrong), would you actually prefer shorts here as well, or is there a specific reason to choosing brisket? Because its quit hard to get short ribs over here I make pastrami using brisket an love it already. Hopefully I can soon try short ribs as well.
Thanks!
At this time and temperature, is the beef easy to shred?
and
On Serious Eats, Kenji brines in a vacuum bag with no liquid. What are your thoughts on this? For me it is ideal as it saves on fridge space.
Yes, I would take short ribs over brisket just about anyv day. But since we were using it a sandwich, i wanted the meat to be less rich.
Hi - It looks like in one of your pictures there are a lot of bay leaves, is this just for photogenic beef, or is it really in the recipe? I don't see it as part of the brine or rub mix. I've got my brisket brining right now following this recipe to a T, on it's 3rd day, curious if I should add a handful of bay leaves.
Hey
I don't have access to pink salt-is it possible to replace that with the same amount of regular sea salt? Or other suggestions?
Does it make a difference wether you take whole or already grinded mace?
I am using a 1KG piece of meat and intend using a container to bone that will take 2 lt water, should the proportions of salt sugar and spice remain the same?
I noticed pictures of Bay Leaves with your corned beef. Is that just for color in the photo or should we be adding Bay as well? I know it's common in many brines.
Pink Salt in this case is 93.75% regular salt (Sodium Chloride) and 6.25% Sodium Nitrite. It is a curing salt. The Sodium Nitrite inhibits the growth of bacteria while the curing process is going on. It also gives the pink color. The pink color from Himalayan salt comes from iron oxide (rust) impurities. It will NOT inhibit bacterial growth like the Sodium Nitrite.
Also, would you recommend leaving the meat to cool in the bag so it rehydrates or am I able to serve it straight out of the bag and start slicing away to serve?
Hello Chefsteps community,
Great recipe!! Congratulations!
Instead of putting the meat in a container for the brine, I can put it in a vacuum plastic bag? because I have no room in my refrigerator for a big water container.
I made this using 1.5Kg. Silverside. I was unable to get brisket at short notice. I used a half mix of salt/spice in 4l water.
I brined for 11 days as that fitted in with my meal planning better. Then SV @60º for 52 hours, again to fit other timing. Despite going over the recommended time, the pink colour did not penetrate all the way through the meat. See photo. Any suggestions on what went wrong? and more importantly how to fix next time? Also the juice in the bag has gelled very nicely. Will this make a good stock, or will the curing salt that will be in it mean that I should just throw it out?
That sure looks like it wasn't brined for long enough. Silverside is a pretty big muscle, and those last bit of distance to the core can take a very long time. it wouldn't surprise me at all if you needed another four or five days to brine all the way too the core.
I think that you'll find that the brine will be too salty to use as a stock on it's own. And I wouldn't recommend concentrating it by reduction either.
Good call Rafael, that will help speed up your brine time too.
That's a bit silly.
Of course you have to CALCULATE how much european salt you have to use.
American Pink Salt has 6,25 Nitrite, the european salt has 0,5 %.
So you have to use roughly 12 times the european Salt as compared to the american one.
So, not 12 grams but 144 Grams. Then you reduce the normal salt accordingly, thus not 240 gram but just 100g of normal Salt.
The result should be EXACTLY the same as the american version.
Pink salt contains nitrites which are essential to the cure so, no, you can't use regular salt instead. Pink salt is also known as Prague powder #1 and you can get it easily online - try eBay or Amazon. Don't confuse it with Himalayan salt which is also pink but is just regular, naturally pink, salt. Prague powder #1 is coloured pink so you don't confuse it with regular salt. Sprinkling those nitrites on your fries is not a good idea!
I couldn't really comment on the mace. I loather the stuff and never ever use it!
That's just not true. I'm in the UK and I buy Prague #1 from the supplier mentioned by Digby. Its nitrite content is 6.25%. I've even bought straight saltpetre in the recent past. The colour of the cure has nothing to do with the colour of the finished product - it's the nitrites that make the meat pink, not the dye in the salt!
Great recipe and worth the wait! Made a killer Reuben with some Emmental cheese and homemade Russian dressing on Rye from my local baker. Next time I'd ask the butcher to leave a little more fat on there or trim the brisket myself.
I'm in middle of sous vide'ing a pre-brined corned beef. I vacuum sealed it. I'm at hour 25 and there is significant amounts of liquid in the bag. I checked and it is not leaking so that must mean that it's coming from the meat. Will this result in a dried out finished product? What can I do to prevent this in the future?
how's the result came out?
Why is the concentration of pink salt in the brine so much less is the corned beef recipe than in your pastrami recipe?
The meat was very soft but really not so juicy
After a successful 12 day brine, my corned beef looks pretty good. I couldn't fit it all in the sous vide bath so I cooked a couple of chunks the old fashioned way in a pot of water with the leftover spice rub, and then used the broth to also cook the potatoes and asparagus.
I had the same problem with mine. A lot of liquid in the bag and the brisket was very soft.
Is there a recipe for your homemade Russian dressing you could share? 😎
This is the best dressing I have found,
https://www.google.com/amp/www.food.com/amp/recipe/zingermans-russian-dressing-for-ruben-sandwiches-452141?client=ms-android-verizon
