Well I did it, Friday evening I bought two vacpac corned beefs. I rinsed them off real good and put them to soak in a new plastic tub and put them in the fridge. Saturday I changed the water two times and in the evening I mixed up a rub patted the meat off and completly coated the meat with the rub and back in the fridge until Sunday mid morning at which time it was add a little more rub where my handeling knocked it off and onto the smoker. It hit 160 somewhere after six or seven hours and just stuck there. The crust wasn't as crispy or dry as I was hoping for so I let it go for a couple of more hours and it got a little darker but not as tough as I thought it should have been even though I let the waterpan run dry (started low on the water too) the temp only came up a degree or two and that could have been just the difference on how I stuck the thremometer. I could have, should have let it go longer if for no other reason than to try and toughen up the skin.
Simple rub
5 T Kosher Salt
8 T Paprika (next time I am gonna go half and half with some hot hungarian)
6 T coriander seeds ground
6 T Brown sugar
4 T Black peppercorns coarse ground
4 T Yellow mustard powder
2 T White peppercorns coarse ground (I actually only had about a teaspoon worth on hand, got to keep a better eye on my supplies)
2 T onion powder
2 T Garlic powder (It called for 16 cloves of minced garlic, but I didn't want a paste and my garlic was looking kind of humble)
1 T Fennel coarse ground (it was on hand so I added it)
I have to be honest, I wish that I would have went with minced garlic or 5 T of powder. The rub smelled so good that I took a pretty good taste of it. I also have to be honest, the rub didn't work into the meat as well as I had hoped leaving me with a very mild pastrami. It took a couple of bites to get the pastrami flavor, but when I built a sandwich it fit in perfect with the brown mustard and rye bread.The meat was firm but not tough, good for slicing and the meat packer did what I would say was an excellent job of trimming the cut, maybe a quarter inch consistant that cooked down to 3/16" or less, I didn't trim off a bit. Next time I will debrine it one more day and then boil up a batch of the rub and marinade it one day in that. I am torn between injecting and not and think I will give the marinade a chance first.
I sliced up one on my slicer and steamed some meat and piled it on pan grilled Rye. On the sandwich it tasted about like a store bought pastrami, mild enough for the wife and kids but about 15% weaker than I was really hoping for. Two schools of thought here, One is that I steam the other one whole and hope that does the trick of making the rub/crust work into the meat or number two. Which would be to sprinkle a little of the rub on the sliced meat as I steam it for sandwiches. I will try number two tomorrow, I am stuffed right now and got to get to cleaning up from my weekend of smoking.
I will give this a 7 out of 10, but in all fairnessI am a pastrami critic. (although I think that is a fair score) My wife said it was good, but what does she know? Look who she is stuck with.
There will be pics as soon as I resize them
Simple rub
5 T Kosher Salt
8 T Paprika (next time I am gonna go half and half with some hot hungarian)
6 T coriander seeds ground
6 T Brown sugar
4 T Black peppercorns coarse ground
4 T Yellow mustard powder
2 T White peppercorns coarse ground (I actually only had about a teaspoon worth on hand, got to keep a better eye on my supplies)
2 T onion powder
2 T Garlic powder (It called for 16 cloves of minced garlic, but I didn't want a paste and my garlic was looking kind of humble)
1 T Fennel coarse ground (it was on hand so I added it)
I have to be honest, I wish that I would have went with minced garlic or 5 T of powder. The rub smelled so good that I took a pretty good taste of it. I also have to be honest, the rub didn't work into the meat as well as I had hoped leaving me with a very mild pastrami. It took a couple of bites to get the pastrami flavor, but when I built a sandwich it fit in perfect with the brown mustard and rye bread.The meat was firm but not tough, good for slicing and the meat packer did what I would say was an excellent job of trimming the cut, maybe a quarter inch consistant that cooked down to 3/16" or less, I didn't trim off a bit. Next time I will debrine it one more day and then boil up a batch of the rub and marinade it one day in that. I am torn between injecting and not and think I will give the marinade a chance first.
I sliced up one on my slicer and steamed some meat and piled it on pan grilled Rye. On the sandwich it tasted about like a store bought pastrami, mild enough for the wife and kids but about 15% weaker than I was really hoping for. Two schools of thought here, One is that I steam the other one whole and hope that does the trick of making the rub/crust work into the meat or number two. Which would be to sprinkle a little of the rub on the sliced meat as I steam it for sandwiches. I will try number two tomorrow, I am stuffed right now and got to get to cleaning up from my weekend of smoking.
I will give this a 7 out of 10, but in all fairnessI am a pastrami critic. (although I think that is a fair score) My wife said it was good, but what does she know? Look who she is stuck with.
There will be pics as soon as I resize them