My 40 Hour Corned Beef Experiment

[nickelmore]

I was wandering about RD and spotted a 12 lb corned beef on the discount shelf. I negotiated a $2.00 per lb price and had rubens on my mind.

I had read up on long cooks and thought this may be something to try it our.

Dialed up the Cummins SV to 140, transferred it to a new bag (the store bag was had a pin hole in it)

After a few hours part of the bag was floating. I guess this can sometimes happens so I trussed the bag to a rack and continued on the journey.

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I had pastrami thoughts corned beef and cabbage with some carrots and Rubens dancing in my head.

After about 40 hours, real juicy, but firm to the touch. Tossed into fridge over night.

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Easy to cut to see what I am dealing with.

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Not real impressed with the fat content, so I did a "little" trimming.

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Between that garbage and the liquid my 12 lber turned into a 6 lber......

Still nice and tight grain.
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So I took half and into to the Hobart Slicer it went.

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Threw the other half on grill.

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I thought it was great, wife did not like the texture. Much better than the traditional slow cooker way that I am use to.

Next time I will pick out my own brisket and cure my own.

[barleypop]

Nice! I'm a corned beef junky!

[barkonbutts]

Looks not too bad if you ask me!!

[curious aardvark]

I've had a few long sv cooked meats - Just too soft imho.
I suspect I'd have been with your wife on this one.

Why go so long ?

[jwbtulsa]

hmmm....

So, based on your pics it looks like a small packer. I bet if you try the same method on a corned beef FLAT your outcome would be much different. Explains why you had to do all that trimming. 12 lbs brisket that cleans out to 6 lbs essentially makes it $4.00 a pound. Better to buy at $3/lbs, trim out the flat and cure the flat yourself as your stated. Save the point for a long braised stew or some smoky burnt ends. Keep all that trimmed fat in the freezer to mix into venison or such. I have done this on occasion and I put the fat cuttings into the smoker while I am doing burnt ends. It liquefies and absorbs the smoky flavor. I stir it every so often while in the smoke. Take it out. Let it cool. Once mostly solidified, I put it in ziplock bags and form it into logs like sticks of butter. Each time I need to ad any fat content to a dish, like beans, I just carve off enough to add the fatty, smoky flavor.

Your beef texture and color look good. I bet she was just practicing to be a KCBS judge and be critical of everything!!

[Slanted88]

Looks not too bad if you ask me!!

Zackly!

[nickelmore]

I've had a few long sv cooked meats - Just too soft imho.
I suspect I'd have been with your wife on this one.

Why go so long ?

What we call in Kentucky.....just for shits and grins. just wanted to see the results. If you read all the BS out available for searching time and temps are all over the board for a corned beef.

I sort of threw a dart at it. Compared to the stringy tough cuts that I grew up on smothered with carrots and potatoes my stuff was way better.

[nickelmore]

hmmm....

So, based on your pics it looks like a small packer. I bet if you try the same method on a corned beef FLAT your outcome would be much different. Explains why you had to do all that trimming. 12 lbs brisket that cleans out to 6 lbs essentially makes it $4.00 a pound. Better to buy at $3/lbs, trim out the flat and cure the flat yourself as your stated. Save the point for a long braised stew or some smoky burnt ends. Keep all that trimmed fat in the freezer to mix into venison or such. I have done this on occasion and I put the fat cuttings into the smoker while I am doing burnt ends. It liquefies and absorbs the smoky flavor. I stir it every so often while in the smoke. Take it out. Let it cool. Once mostly solidified, I put it in ziplock bags and form it into logs like sticks of butter. Each time I need to ad any fat content to a dish, like beans, I just carve off enough to add the fatty, smoky flavor.

Your beef texture and color look good. I bet she was just practicing to be a KCBS judge and be critical of everything!!

Yea I did the math, glad I did not pay full price. I will make sure I get a flat next time. I just had big visions of slices of corned beef for sandwiches. I see meat glue in my future, maybe stack 3 or 4 flats.

Interesting on the fat, I did not think about that since in had pickling spices and cure around it. Smoke probably would have taken care of that.

[Richtee]

I bet she was just practicing to be a KCBS judge and be critical of everything!!

Yeah, looked OK to me too. We all seen much worse..heh!

[HawgHeaven]

I've had a few long sv cooked meats - Just too soft imho.
I suspect I'd have been with your wife on this one.

Why go so long ?

Yeah, seems too long to me. Long cooks like that tend to give the meat a mealy/mushy texture. Don't get me wrong, I am not criticizing, the meat looks great! It's amazing how many opinions on SV cook times are out there. I am not a fan of long SV cooks. Done a few, and did not care for the results. I had a guy tell me to cook a beef eye roast for 72 hours. WTF? Nope.

[nickelmore]

Thats sort of why I picked a lower temp and longer time,,,I never had done one.

As a tougher cut like a brisket I thought is was good, I just picked up a packer versus a flat. Since it was a week before St. Paddy's day its all RD had,

I still like the texture of what I sliced up. Very tight and not stringy or falling apart like a normal crock pot would turn out.

Would I do it again......maybe.

[zombini]

for the share. I bet the sammies were good!

[nickelmore]

I had all good intentions on a nice sandwich but I sliced it all up on the big ol hobart and put it in 1 lb bags.

I grab a bag from fridge to make a sandwich and start nibbling on the shreds and next thing I know half the bag is gone and I don't feel like a sandwich..........