Pastrami

[bballbaby]

The easy way is just buy premade corned beef, especially if you have a good local butcher shop that makes it regularly. Unfortunately in southern California the only time it really shows up in stores is around st paddys day so I have resorted to corning my own briskets.

As far as the brine goes I use Alton Browns Corned beef recipe only doubled to accommodate a packer size brisket.

Prep for smoking is super simple, Plain old yellow mustard massage as a base to get everything to stick nicely, followed by a LIGHT dusting of 50/50 garlic and onion powder from a shaker and then a HEAVY coating of black pepper.

Thats it! I smoke it with apple wood at 225*-245* until a it feels relaxed or a tooth pick goes into it like its butter. Generally speaking they take between 10-12 hours.

Fairly certain I can follow that recipe!! I'll smoke it until the internal temp goes above the 165 deg plateau...which is the recommended practice for smoking brisket.

 

[bballbaby]

OK, here come the questions...

Do you really brine for 10 days?
Do you just rinse off the brine and then rub it and smoke it?

 

[irie]

Yes I brine for 10 days, I have seen recipes with soak time ranging anywhere from 7-14 days so 10 is pretty standard for pickling a brisket. I am clearly no rocket scientist though so I stick with the recipe haha.

Yup I just give it a quick rinse in cold water and pat it dry with a clean kitchen towel before prepping it and throwing it straight into the smoker.

I have also made pastrami with the prepackaged corned beefs in jet-rods recipe and found them to occasionally be extremely salty and I can only assume they are over brined? Soaking them in fresh water for a few hours can definitely help reduce this but if you have the time pickling your own brisket at home is well worth the little bit of extra effort.

 

[irie]

As far as temp goes, I never smoke beef (briskets) to a set temp I always go by feel. In my experience beef is by far the least consistent and the least forgiving cut to smoke, the window for perfection is very very small.

 

[Cigary43]

Oh sumbich that looks good....I love pastrami! I understand that Caligula killed himself on a triple decker pastrami sammy while doing some very unsavory things with 12 of his concubines. Some potato salad and a few Claussen pickles would really finish that picture.