I like to cook my corned beef in the crock pot and do the cabbage and potatoes separate but my mom does them in the same pot except the potatoes. I add extra pickling spice while I cook it for extra flavor. Last year I made my corned beef from scratch and used a chuck roast or blade roast instead of a brisket. We loved it. It took 3 weeks to cure.

I also use a crockpot. And I use a bottle of beer for liquid. Add the carrots and potatoes much closer to serving time, and the cabbage for only the last 30 minutes or so.

A pressure cooker makes this traditional St. Paddy’s day meal much easier. Ordinarily, a corned beef brisket would take 3 or 4 hours to cook. Here it’s about a third of that, and most of that time you’re not doing anything. --From a meal-planning standpoint, this is a very convenient dish. A packaged corned beef brisket stays good in the fridge for several weeks, and a cabbage has a long storage life as well--so you can have those items available in your fridge for cooking at the last minute. You can make it with just cabbage, or throw in some root vegetables like potatoes and carrots. Either way, it’s ridiculously easy and good. The leftovers (if there are any) make excellent sandwiches or hash.

4 cups water or other liquid (see Variations below)
2 large bay leaves
3 to 5 lb corned beef brisket
4 lbs potatoes, scrubbed
1 small (2 1/2 lb) green cabbage

Put the water in a 6 qt or larger pressure cooker. Add the bay leaves. Put corned beef in pressure cooker, fatty side up, along with any juices from the package and the contents of any spice pack that may have been packed with the beef. Don’t worry if the brisket doesn’t fit on the bottom; just let one side point upwards along the side of the cooker. (It’s going to shrink a huge amount, probably 50%.) Arrange the potatoes on top of the beef.
Lock the lid in place. Over high heat, bring the pressure cooker up to high pressure and adjust the burner to keep it just at high pressure. Pressure cook it on high for about 55-60 minutes for a 3 pound brisket, 65 minutes for a 4 pound brisket, or 70-75 minutes for a 5 pound brisket. Then allow the pressure to go down naturally (that is, don’t vent the cooker or put it under cold water)--that might take as long as 15 minutes. During that time, trim the cabbage: remove the outer layer or two of leaves, cut the cabbage in half (pole to pole, not through the equator). Cut the dense core out of the stem end of each half and discard. Cut the halves in thirds lengthwise (along meridians, not across the equator). Once the pressure is down, open the cooker and remove the potatoes to a platter, covering with aluminum foil to keep warm. Put the brisket on a platter, fatty side up. If there is less than 1 cup of liquid in the cooker, add sufficient water to make 1 cup. Put the cabbage in the cooker, put the top on, and return the cooker to high--once on high, cook for 3 minutes. You can bring the pressure down quickly now, either by venting the pressure cooker or by putting the cooker in the sink and running cold water over it. Open the cooker and scoop out the cabbage, allowing it to drain, and place it on the platter.

Don’t try to carve the corned beef until it has rested for a while--it’ll shred to bits. Remove a lot of the surface fat from the beef by scraping it with a blunt instrument like a teaspoon. Carve by starting at one corner, carving the corned beef across the grain--otherwise it’ll be stringy.

Guinness stout goes very well with this.

Variations: instead of water, use stout or beer or any combination of those three liquids.

If you're looking for something a bit different for the leftovers we LOVE this hash. It's a change from the traditional Yankee Red Flannel Hash.

Golden Flannel Hash

Ingredients:

2 tablespoons each butter and olive oil
1 red onion, chopped,
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/2 pound cooked corned beef, cut into small cubes
3/4 pound small red potatoes, cooked and cubed (do not peel)
3/4 pound yellow beets (tops removed), cooked, peeled, and cubed
Salt and pepper
Eggs, for poaching
Chopped parsley, optional
Green Chile Hollandaise, recipe follows

Directions:

Heat butter and oil in a large iron skillet; add onion and pepper and saute until soft, about 5 minutes. Add thyme, corned beef, potatoes, beets, and salt and pepper, to taste. Spread in a layer and cook over medium-high heat until potatoes begin to crisp on bottom, about 10 minutes (lift with a spatula to check). Place a lid or heat safe plate that is slightly smaller in diameter than the skillet over the hash to tamp it down and make it extra-crisp.

Meanwhile, poach 1 or 2 eggs per serving until done to your liking. Spoon hash onto plates and top each portion with eggs, sprinkle with parsley, and serve with hollandaise.

Roasted Green Chile Hollandaise:

3 egg yolks
3 tablespoons lemon juice
8 ounces butter, very soft or melted
3 tablespoons minced roasted green chile
1 scallion, minced
Pinch cayenne
Salt
In a double burner with barely simmering water, whisk the yolks with the lemon juice until light and frothy. Whisk in the butter in 2-tablespoon increments. The sauce will seem thin at first, but continue to whisk until the sauce thickens. Be careful not to overcook because the eggs will scramble. When sauce is thick, remove from heat and stir in remaining ingredients. Serve immediately over hash.

/tricia

Here's a great thread from last year with many opinions!

Here is a link that might be useful: Corned beef 2012

Thanks for the advice and the link to last year's thread. Sorry, I should have done a search before posting. Anyway, I did just spend some time going through last year's thread. I feel a little less clueless now.

Don't be sorry! It was time for a corned beef thread anyway.

I've done both stove top and crock pot and prefer the flavor of stove top. I can't remember which is which but I buy the more expensive cut for the beef as it is usually a lot leaner. I do the potatoes separately as there isn't room in my pot for everything....I boil up the corned beef with an onion, sliced, 4 cloves, 6 whole black pepper, 1 bay leaf, 1/2 t dried rosemary, 1 clove garlic, 1 small green pepper sliced, chopped celery, chopped carrot on the stove for about 4 hours. About 1/2 hour before the beef is done, I add cabbage wedges and let them simmer with everything. When done, I remove the cabbage to one bowl, the beef to a board to slice and then strain all the rest which is a messy but tasty side dish of the other vegetable.

You can bake, stew, roast or pressure cook corned beef. You can even smoke corned beef ( pastrami ).

I had done a side-by-side comparison:

Corned beef cooked the normal way - 50% shrinkage.
Sous vide cooked corned beef - 15% shrinkage.

Also, it is easy to pickle your own corned beef, if you don't like chemicals.

dcarch

If I can find corned beef eye round cut I buy that. Almost no fat or shrinkage. And often times it is cheaper than the brisket. And I don't think the eye is as salty. I wonder if the fatty portions of the brisket hold more salt. Unfortunetely the eye round is not always available.

I've done corned beef (both brisket and eye) in the oven and on the stove top. They come out great either way. I prefer the eye round done in the oven at 300 degrees with the vegetables added halfway through the cooking time.

Olychick - I remember that thread. The forum has come a long way in the last year......lots of changes. I am REALLY loving the new format!

Teresa

I made corned beef from scratch once. Like Teresa, I found the fresh brisket to be more expensive - I assume because of the shorter shelf life. About 3x more expensive in my case. Then there was the cost of the spices. And then there was the end product - very unimpressive even though I followed Alton Brown's highly rated recipe to a 'T', including the curing salt. The only good that came of that experiment was making smoke bombs with the leftover saltpetre - I think that was Jimster's recommendation!

Edit - I misread Teresa's comment about price

In a week or so I expect to see tubs of homemade corned beef at my supermarket. I think I'll buy a big hunk and cut it in thirds, simmer one, bake a second and sous vide the third and see which I prefer. Dcarch - recommended time/temp for SV?

This post was edited by foodonastump on Tue, Mar 5, 13 at 10:19

As far as baking it goes...I've been making a very tender and juicy center cut pork roast (not the tenderloin roast) by spreading it with mustard and brown sugar, wrapping it tightly in foil, and baking it at 275 degrees for two hours. It produces a lot of juice to simmer in. I transfer it to a baking sheet and give it a shot of high convection heat to brown it, or you can broil it for a few minutes. I haven't gone back to dry-baking a pork roast since I tried it this way.

I wonder if the foil method would work well for corned beef, with increased baking time. I usually boil corned beef and then drizzle it with a mustard brown sugar glaze and put it into the oven for a few minutes. I steam the vegetables, so I wouldn't miss the cooking water.

Does anyone put a little vinegar on the cabbage? We always did, so I wonder if that's a New England tradition.

I always put a couple of beers in with the water a couple of sliced onions and a big handful of smashed fresh garlic brine packets black pepper and a couple of tablespoons of spicy brown mustard handful of sugar 2 fresh bay leaves. Don't ask about theconcept of this recipe this is how ive been doing it since im a kid...LOL... I cook low and slow for many hours on the stove top I do the cabbage seperatly or it gets a bit greasy. I make corned beef every year for 25-50 people and theres never a complaint :)

Yep. I like a little vinegar on my cabbage. And on my spinach.

I just returned from the grocery store where I was browsing in the meat section. Picked up a corned beef and it was marked $23! Second one I checked was $21. Wondering if they will come to their senses by St, Paddy's day.

Joan Eileen, your post made me check my local store for prices. Corned Beef is running here at $4.49/lb. for flat and $3.79/lb. for point. They're selling in 4 lb. packages so $15.16 and $17.96 respectively. I'm in the northeast.

/tricia

A couple of years ago I purchased some Kobe corned beef from Byerlys - an upscale store here in Minnesota. They brand a number of items. I got a Kobe corned beef flat for $6.99 a pound on sale. It is normally $8.99 a pound. I used to buy a brisket every year at St. Patrick's day for my mom. So 2-3 years ago that was the one I brought her. I will say we both thought it was the best corned beef we have ever eaten - and not very salty. Also the broth/veggies were not that salty or fatty. The meat did not shrink very much either.

My mother can no longer have any salt because of heart trouble. The Kobe brisket was her last taste of corned beef so it was worth the splurge because she is still talking about it! :-)

Coincidentally the manager of the meat department was just behind me in the checkout line. I asked him when the masses of corned beef are coming in - Friday. O'Donnell's (I know nothing about the brand) which is currently showing up as $3.79/lb online (Peapod - I'm guessing this is where Tricia looked, too.) will be $1.79. Other brands "won't be bad, either" according to him. This is right in line with what I remember from last year.

My mother and grandmothers would roll over in there grave if they were here to see those prices!

Thanks, FOAS! Yep, I looked at Peapod. Guess we'll be waiting to get the corned beef...lol

/t

Costco usually has a great selection at a very good price. That's where I'll buy mine next week.

About "Kobe" beef, what you saw in the store at $6.99 certainly was not Kobe, and at that price, probably not even Wagyu.

Here is a link that might be useful: Kobe beef

"---About "Kobe" beef, what you saw in the store at $6.99 certainly was not Kobe, and at that price, probably not even Wagyu."

Anything is possible.

This week, Stop & Shop Super market has Lobster tails at $6.99 a lb. Normally Lobster tails are $40 to $55 a lb.

I bought 10 of them. :-). Should have gotten more if I had the room in the freezer.

dcarch

The Costco stores in Minnesota aren't carrying the same brands of corned beef they have in the past. I mentioned only a month ago in another thread that Costco for several years sold the Vienna Beef brand of corned beef. I have visited 3 Costco stores in the last 2 weeks and they all had the "Sy Ginsberg" brand at about $3.50 a pound. I looked at many briskets at all three stores. They were all extremely fatty. In fact - the fattiest and most disgusting corned beef briskets I've ever seen. Not even close to the quality of the other brands Costco has offered in the past. Now I know some people like well marbled, fatty corned beef. But I won't be buying my CB at Costco this year. Sushi - perhaps your Costco if offering a different product. I know the products vary by region.

FOAS, I have sous vided corned beef many times. Each time I have done it differently.

This year, I think I think I will go with 135F for 36 hours.

dcarch

I posted in last year's thread that I think Trader Joe's has some of the best corned beef I've ever eaten. I cooked it in a bake-in bag. Amazingly tasty.

Oly - I will give TJ's corned beef a try. I was just there last weekend and did not see any - but I was not looking either.

Thanks for the reminder!

Trader Joe's is still selling corned beef and cabbage (at least last Sunday), and I thought it sounded good because it is made without nitrates, but when I tasted a sample, it had a strong flavor of clove, which I hate, and so I did not buy any. If you do plan to buy any at TJ's, be sure to get a sample first - you may not like their combination of spices. Theirs could have used more black pepper and bay leaf for a better flavor, but then I don't like cloves on ham either.

Lars

Trader Joe's is still selling corned beef and cabbage (at least last Sunday), and I thought it sounded good because it is made without nitrates, but when I tasted a sample, it had a strong flavor of clove, which I hate, and so I did not buy any. If you do plan to buy any at TJ's, be sure to get a sample first - you may not like their combination of spices. Theirs could have used more black pepper and bay leaf for a better flavor, but then I don't like cloves on ham either.

Lars

Lars, I wonder if they prepared it with a glaze or something? My tj's corned beef has literally no cloves or clove taste at all. I didn't even see a clove in the pickling spices packaged with it, although I would guess there would be some. Just mustard seed and bay leaf and black peppercorn that I could see and taste.

The corned beef I had was loose (no glaze), and I could see no cloves, but the taste was definitely there. I didn't even look at the packaging since I had already decided that I didn't like it because of the clove flavor. Other than that, it was good, and for those who like cloves in the corned beef, it would be exceptionally good. Perhaps they make it differently in different parts of the country. I think that if they had used 1/3 as much clove, it would have been acceptable, and perhaps the cloves they used were fresher than what they expected.

Lars

This post was edited by publickman on Wed, Mar 20, 13 at 1:32