Smoked Meat

I’ve made pastrami before and

this time round I’m making Montreal style smoked meat starting with a 3.5 lb corned beef brisket that will probably lose 10% of it’s weight when I’m done.

I’ve made pastrami before andthis time round I’m making Montreal style smoked meat starting with a 3.5 lb corned beef brisket that will probably lose 10% of it’s weight when I’m done.Step one will be tothoroughly wash the brisket to remove any excess salt. I have found a few times over an hour is enough. Discard any spices that came with the brisket. You’ll be using your own.

Apply a very light coating of

olive oil to help the rub adhere to the meat.

Time to prepare the spices and coat the brisket. Here’s my rub:

4 tablespoons fresh coarsely ground black pepper

2 tablespoons coriander powder

1 teaspoon mustard powder

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1 tablespoon paprika

2 teaspoons garlic powder

2 teaspoons onion powder

After the rub’s applied, make sure you have

covered the whole brisket, top, bottom, sides and ends, rub it in good, then wrap it in saran wrap or a baggy, put it in the fridge and say good-night for 2 days. I’ll be back in 2 days.

Time to wake up your brisket and prepare to cook it

in the smoker. If you don’t have a smoker use your grill using indirect heat with a pan filled with wood chips on the side, works almost as well. Get the smoker up to 225F then add your wood or chips, I prefer cherry but I didn’t have any so I’m using birch today. Make sure you remove any bark. Yes you do see snow, it was only 23*F today

After about 3 hours remove from the smoker andwrap it in 3 layers of aluminum foil. You now have a choice: finish it off back in the smoker or put it in the oven set a 225F in an oven proof dish, either way, same results. Cook until meat reaches 190F then it’s done. Should take about 7 hours total start to finish.Let it cool for an hour then place it in a baggy still wrapped in the foil and put it in the fridge overnight to let all those delicious juices marry.

By now you really want to eat this right?? This is what I do the next day since we havea slicer. Slice the meat, about 6 oz makes a great sandwich, and yes it’s still cold. Cut as much as you want at the time. No slicer, no problem, a sharp knife works’....Last step, promise. The meat has to be steamed,NOT micro waved. Steam adds moisture, microwave dries it out. We have a rice steamer, works perfect, or use a saucepan with a little water in it, cover with a piece of foil indented, and place the meat in. cover with the lid.

. Put it on rye with mustard and a dill pickle on the side. We prefer to slice all the meat at once and place 12oz of meat into individual baggies and freeze them till we’re ready for a sandwich. Yes, this seems like a lot of work, but the final product is so, so good. Just like a real deli…. This brisket will yield about 6-7 sandwiches. Considering this brisket cost $8.99 that works out to be about $1.35 / sandwich. Where as a Deli would charge about $8.00 for just one. …… Enjoy.