Fat Woody
is one Smokin' Farker
OK - trying a few new recipes and methods today and hopefully posting some coherent methodology as I go along.
I have been wanting to make a real corned beef and pastrami for a while now, so first order of business this morning was to retrieve my brisket from it's pickling bath. I picked up a smallish (9 lb) packer a few days ago and separated the point and flat.
The point would be made into corned beef and the flat would become pastrami. Using the recipe in Michael Ruhlman's Charcuterie (with Brian Polcyn) for pastrami, I brined/pickled the two pieces for three days. The point was simply cooked by braising in a covered roasting pan in a slow oven (250*) for about three hours. I wanted to produce a "standard corned beef" as a benchmark and this was my first attempt, so the oven was the way to go. The resulting product is great, excuse me for saying so myself, but it really is good!! Here's the finished corny:
Part two of the brisket equation was the pastrami and for that the only differences were cooking it on the smoker with a 50-50 rub of ground black pepper and coriander seed. The pastrami went on the smoker at 9:00 AM and is still getting happy, more on that later.
One of the other things I wanted to do was test a couple of new flavor profiles for our comp. pork. I had a small (4 lb) bone-in roast and my competition partner-in-crime Alan brought over a 7 lb butt to make for his dad's 90th birthday celebration. His dad lis a big time pulled pork aficionado! Kim and Andy from Smoke on Wheels were kind enough to hook me up with some of their Pork Marinade and Injection (thanks Kim!), so inserting shameless plug here:
IT'S GOOD STUFF, GO GET SOME!
Combined that with some AJ and a new rub (one I have not used for pork before) and marinated both overnight. Strained the marinade this morning and injected both butts, then rubbed with a slightly modified version of Myron's Basic BBQ Rub from his book Smoking with Myron Mixon (also good stuff!).
I am using the pan method as we have had some success with it in the past.
Into the smoker around 9:30 and targeting 250* for the cook. The third component will be beef ribs for dinner tonight, so stay tuned for updates...which frankly, may not come until tomorrow, depending on how many beers I've had!
I have been wanting to make a real corned beef and pastrami for a while now, so first order of business this morning was to retrieve my brisket from it's pickling bath. I picked up a smallish (9 lb) packer a few days ago and separated the point and flat.
The point would be made into corned beef and the flat would become pastrami. Using the recipe in Michael Ruhlman's Charcuterie (with Brian Polcyn) for pastrami, I brined/pickled the two pieces for three days. The point was simply cooked by braising in a covered roasting pan in a slow oven (250*) for about three hours. I wanted to produce a "standard corned beef" as a benchmark and this was my first attempt, so the oven was the way to go. The resulting product is great, excuse me for saying so myself, but it really is good!! Here's the finished corny:
Part two of the brisket equation was the pastrami and for that the only differences were cooking it on the smoker with a 50-50 rub of ground black pepper and coriander seed. The pastrami went on the smoker at 9:00 AM and is still getting happy, more on that later.
One of the other things I wanted to do was test a couple of new flavor profiles for our comp. pork. I had a small (4 lb) bone-in roast and my competition partner-in-crime Alan brought over a 7 lb butt to make for his dad's 90th birthday celebration. His dad lis a big time pulled pork aficionado! Kim and Andy from Smoke on Wheels were kind enough to hook me up with some of their Pork Marinade and Injection (thanks Kim!), so inserting shameless plug here:
IT'S GOOD STUFF, GO GET SOME!
Combined that with some AJ and a new rub (one I have not used for pork before) and marinated both overnight. Strained the marinade this morning and injected both butts, then rubbed with a slightly modified version of Myron's Basic BBQ Rub from his book Smoking with Myron Mixon (also good stuff!).
I am using the pan method as we have had some success with it in the past.
Into the smoker around 9:30 and targeting 250* for the cook. The third component will be beef ribs for dinner tonight, so stay tuned for updates...which frankly, may not come until tomorrow, depending on how many beers I've had!
