Pastrami

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Rag1

Executive Chef
Joined
Jun 24, 2007
Messages
3,022
Location
Berks Cty, Pa.
I made a pastrami for the first time last year and it came out bad...mostly from not curing long enough.
This year it cured in brine for 15 days. In the pic it looks like cadaver meat.
Coated with commercial ground black pepper and ground coriander (50/50).
Cooked in smoker for 2 hours at 130* : then 2 hours at 180* with smoke : then 2 more hrs @ 180* no smoke : and finished 7 hrs at 220* in oven till meat temp hit 175*.
Coarse ground pepper would have been better.
Has a salty taste, but not noticed in a sandwich.
Over all, pleased with this year's attempt.



 
Damn that looks good Rag! My wife made Pastrami sammies for dinner last night! Cooked in beef broth of course. ;)
 
I used the recipe out of Kutas' cookbook. Haven't re-checked it yet, but will pull back on the salt. use cracked pepper too.
 
One of the things I’ve found with the Kutas book is the recipes are very basic and sometimes need to be tweeked a little…

We typically scrub or rinse the outside of the meat after its been brined to remove excess salt, the other thing I’ve noticed is straight out the smokehouse things tend to taste a little salty and some of the other flavors tend to hang out some….but after a day or two this isn’t the case…how was the pastrami after a day or two after the flavors had time to set?
 
wittdog said:
One of the things I’ve found with the Kutas book is the recipes are very basic and sometimes need to be tweeked a little…

We typically scrub or rinse the outside of the meat after its been brined to remove excess salt, the other thing I’ve noticed is straight out the smokehouse things tend to taste a little salty and some of the other flavors tend to hang out some….but after a day or two this isn’t the case…how was the pastrami after a day or two after the flavors had time to set?
I would have to agree. Thought I tanked my last one, but the next day it was great.

Pigs
 
Looks great Rag. Think I messed you up last time..if so sure am sorry. I increased the amount of TQ in that brine recipe I mess around with based on your expuriences with it. Hopefully it now strong enough to give up on the blotchy appearance after a few days..or then maybe soaking longer is the key. I used to make a bunch of the stuff using an old timey "float an egg" brine and salt peter and the recipe called for a 10 day soak without any injection. Made great corned beef it just come out so salty it nearly had to be boiled so it be fit to eat. Aint no way a person could make pastrami out of it I dont think. Anyway kindly excuse the rambling and glad the new strategy worked out good for ya. I'm gonna get industrious and make some mo of that stuff one of these days:)

bigwheel
 
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