Monday, March 17, 2008
Saint Patrick's Day
Never heard of "Corned Beef and Cabbage" in England - even growing up in a city with a large Irish population (Birmingham aka Brum)
It is eaten everywhere here and I cooked it today - a big day in the US - people wearing green and even drinking green beer!
The corned beef is entirely different from what the English call Corned Beef - which is equally good but comes from Argentina in a can.
It is, however, exactly the same as the Salt Beef eaten in England - more in London than Brum.
I was all ready to brine it myself but it takes two weeks and I only had one day. All the meat departments had some ready salted though so all I had to do was boil it and add veggies and cabbage near the end of cooking. The secret of making it pink is the addition of Sodium Nitrate - this is the difference between curing and brining and keeps ham and beef pink after cooking.
The shop I went to "Whole Foods" claims that nitrates are harmful so they just used salt and spices in their brine and the result was brown beef not pink. The flavor, it is claimed, is not changed.
Some Irish Soda Bread - easy to make from start to finish in an hour and the day was celebrated.
This was a Google pic - mine, as expained, was not pink.
It is eaten everywhere here and I cooked it today - a big day in the US - people wearing green and even drinking green beer!
The corned beef is entirely different from what the English call Corned Beef - which is equally good but comes from Argentina in a can.
It is, however, exactly the same as the Salt Beef eaten in England - more in London than Brum.
I was all ready to brine it myself but it takes two weeks and I only had one day. All the meat departments had some ready salted though so all I had to do was boil it and add veggies and cabbage near the end of cooking. The secret of making it pink is the addition of Sodium Nitrate - this is the difference between curing and brining and keeps ham and beef pink after cooking.
The shop I went to "Whole Foods" claims that nitrates are harmful so they just used salt and spices in their brine and the result was brown beef not pink. The flavor, it is claimed, is not changed.
Some Irish Soda Bread - easy to make from start to finish in an hour and the day was celebrated.
This was a Google pic - mine, as expained, was not pink.
# posted by william @ 5:15 PM 
