Navel Brisket?

[Taipan]

Anybody familiar with a Navel Brisket? It’s supposed to be a beef belly as opposed to the more common pork belly. It’s about 3.5 Kilos or 7.5lbs. The price is 1451 Thai Baht or about $44 so I’m considering using it as a training brisket. I’m still learning how to use my KBQ C-60 smoker. It will arrive frozen so after thawing I plan to slice it into more manageable 12” slices. I will attempt to make beef bacon with one and make beef burnt ends out of the rest. Any ideas welcome.

[DTro]

Can't help with your question, but you just answered a question of mine. I had an udon beef dish in Japan recently. I swore up and down to my wife that it was belly meat. She didn't believe that. This proves the possibility. Please share your results.

[gboss]

I am not 100% sure, but I thought the beef they used for niku udon is chuck/ribeye/strip (i.e. Somewhere on the longissimus dorsi) with a decent amount of the fat left on. When it's sliced that thinly and the fat contracts as it cooks, does often get that wavy cooked bacon look. Sukiyaki and Gyudon have similar looking thinly sliced and simmered beef. Not saying it's impossible that it was belly, but that's not something I have heard of being used.

[CHNeal]

I can not wait to see how this turns out!

[BBQandLove]

I’m not familiar with it, but oh my, the possibilities are amazing

[DaveD]

Very interesting! Look forward to more.

[gboss]

We wouldn't call that brisket here in the US, but would probably cook fairly similarly. You're right about it being the beef version of pork belly. The brisket is usually considered to be the pectoral muscles, closer to the chest of the cow.

Some of the classic pastrami places use navel to make the pastrami, so that'd be an interesting thing to try. Meathead's "close to Katz" is a great resource and recipe.

My vote is pastrami.

[captainlee]

You are very knowledgeable on Asian cooking. Were you trained or just learned on your own because you have an interest.

[gboss]

captainlee I don't have any formal training in this, just an interest. My wife has formal culinary training and we lived in Japan for a little while, however.

[Taipan]

That’s a great idea you cannot imagine what passes for pastrami here. For a king’s ransom it’s served sliced super thin on a thick layer of tasteless lettuce into a sandwich of nothing.