Corned Beef Color


 

Darren C.

TVWBB Pro
Is this the right color for corned beef? I am using the Morton's Tender Quick recipe. It says 5 days of curing per inch of thickness. This has been curing for 9.5 days. I think the thickest part was only about 1.25 inches. So, it should have been curing plenty of time. But, I can't tell by the color if the middle is cured properly.

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And, yes. This is going in the crockpot. Sorry. I wanted to smoke it. But, this is my first time to try corned beef and I didn't want to go off the rails with it. The recipe calls for a dutch oven. But, it's too big. I had to cut this in half just to fit it in the crockpot as well as I did.
 
the stuff in the center looks like some samples I've cut off - I think it's cured. I used pink salt (from the Charcuterie book Ruhlman..), and it only called for 3 days.

Here's one vote (guess) for yes - hope somebody who knows more chimes in with a more definitive answer for you.
 
Well, it's finished. I think it came out okay (ie. safe). It sure does taste good.

I'm still so uncomfortable with curing. I don't know enough about it to recognize what's normal, abnormal and basically "what's the worst case scenario". I'm following recipes the best that I can and using the best judgement that I can. But, it's hard to make judgement calls when you're as ignorant as I am about the process. Can you recommend a book or resource to learn more about it? I know Morton's has one. I'm using Tender Quick. So, I prefer something that uses it so that I don't have to convert from pink salt to TQ.

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Looks good! How'd you cook it? (time/pit temp/finished temp/smoke wood) Anything you'd do differently next time?
 
Looks good! How'd you cook it? (time/pit temp/finished temp/smoke wood) Anything you'd do differently next time?


Thanks. I cooked it in the crockpot on high for about 9 hours. I was going by the Morton's recipe as closely as I could. It wouldn't fit the meat in my Dutch oven though. So, I improvised and used the crockpot instead. I did smoke some Canadian Bacon today though. It was pretty good too. That makes 2 times for Canadian Bacon. This was my first Corned Beef.

As far as anything that I'd do differently, well, I want to know why the meat looked raw in the middle. I don't know if that is normal or an indication that I need to improve on temp control, timing or something. In regards to taste, I thought it was outstanding. So, unless there was a problem with the color, I wouldn't change anything.
 
The color is normal. That is one of the reasons/side effects for the pink salt. It gives you a nice color instead of just brown when cooked.
 

 

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