I find the corned beef you cure yourself with Meathead's recipe is in fact better than the stuff you can buy at the store. If someone has never had it it is still pretty good, but there is a step down. I just had to try it one time.
I use those big 2.5 gallon Zip Lock bags to cure.
If you want flat, you can actually cut yourself ALL FLAT, not buy something labeled flat only to have mostly point, which was still pretty good since we are talking Select (meaning it wasn't over fatty, I prefer leaner stuff). Tried my best to figure what was in the dang bag.
Curing yourself you don't have to desalinate enough to desalinate the world's oceans, and I love salt. You'd better desalinate AND change out the water on a store bought a few times. Time don't mean squat once equilibrium takes place. I rinsed, soaked for an hour, changed water and soaked another 3 hours, then refilled the pot as full as I could get it and let it go another 8+ hours. I barely got it down enough.
Granted with all the salt a store bought will last about a month in the fridge until you have to use or freeze. Even halotolerant bacteria die in that crap. When they say "up to 35%" they mean every bit of that.
I would definitely recommend putting the rub on a day or two ahead of the smoke.
I smoke these dudes pretty much uncovered all the way. I took this dude up to 208 internal for quite some time. I was hoping to hit 210. And those temps were checked with the Thermapen. Just before 200 I wrapped up the already very dark outer edges so they would not "jerkify" too much. After the smoke it was wrapped and held in a 150 degree toaster oven for over 2 hours. It was still over 170 when I pulled it out the oven.
I sliced at 140-ish. No sous vide pre or post smoke and no steaming.
Pics, just picture pastrami.
I use those big 2.5 gallon Zip Lock bags to cure.
If you want flat, you can actually cut yourself ALL FLAT, not buy something labeled flat only to have mostly point, which was still pretty good since we are talking Select (meaning it wasn't over fatty, I prefer leaner stuff). Tried my best to figure what was in the dang bag.
Curing yourself you don't have to desalinate enough to desalinate the world's oceans, and I love salt. You'd better desalinate AND change out the water on a store bought a few times. Time don't mean squat once equilibrium takes place. I rinsed, soaked for an hour, changed water and soaked another 3 hours, then refilled the pot as full as I could get it and let it go another 8+ hours. I barely got it down enough.
Granted with all the salt a store bought will last about a month in the fridge until you have to use or freeze. Even halotolerant bacteria die in that crap. When they say "up to 35%" they mean every bit of that.
I would definitely recommend putting the rub on a day or two ahead of the smoke.
I smoke these dudes pretty much uncovered all the way. I took this dude up to 208 internal for quite some time. I was hoping to hit 210. And those temps were checked with the Thermapen. Just before 200 I wrapped up the already very dark outer edges so they would not "jerkify" too much. After the smoke it was wrapped and held in a 150 degree toaster oven for over 2 hours. It was still over 170 when I pulled it out the oven.
I sliced at 140-ish. No sous vide pre or post smoke and no steaming.
Pics, just picture pastrami.
Comment