Anyone smoke a corned beef?

[veryolddog]

Has anyone here, smoked a corned beef that you have purchased from the supermarket?

I have purchased packaged corned beef in the market with the little package of spices and slow cooked it in a crock pot usually adding vegetable towards the end. I have been thinking about doing this in the pellet smoker at either 200 or 225 degrees for 10 to 12 hours or whatever.

If you have done this before, how did you do this? Did you use the spice packet? Did you put it directly on the grill? Or, did you put it into an aluminum pan with liquid in order to recreate the steaming effect? What is your process and was the result worth your efforts?

I am interested in finding out what experience, if any, you have had with a packaged corned beef?

Thanks,

Ed

[bbqchef]

Depending on what spices/ rub you use smoked corned beef becomes pastrami.

[squirtthecat]

I've done a few on the pellet grill.  Some with a Pastrami rub, some 'nekkid'.

The one that turned out the best was suspended over a foil pan of Guinness to get some moisture/steam..


MrsSTC prefers them steamed in the pressure cooker, so I haven't hit any with smoke for a while now.   

[muebe]

I have made the corned beef into pastrami using Hub's method with great results.

I have not smoked corned beef as is however...

[ACW3]

Some time back (probably several years ago now) I bought four packages of corned beef.  I wanted to make pastrami using Hub's method and do a corned beef on my MAK.  Knowing that the corned beef required a lot of cooking, I cooked it at 225 (using hickory pellets) until I got the right temperature, somewhere around 200 IT.  I let it rest before I sliced it.  Neither my wife nor I cared for the results.  It didn't taste close to the corned beef flavor we expected.  On the other hand, the pastrami's I have made on the MAK have all been great.  We have gone back to cooking our corned beef in our crock pot.  My wife is Irish and must have her corned beef and little whole potatoes.

I have not done a corned beef like STC's version over a pan of Guinness.  I may have to give this a try and go with a milder pellet flavor like maple or alder. 

I will follow this post to see if there is something else about pellet cooking a corned beef that I must check out.  Good luck.

Art

[smoker pete]

I smoked a 4½ lb store bought Corned Beef Flat Cut Brisket in my MAK 2 Star a couple of years ago ...  Here's a summary of the post from my blog:

Preheated the MAK 2 Star to 225ºF with Hickory and smoked for 5½ hours.  After 5½ hours the Internal Temperature (IT) was 158ºF and I bumped the temperature to 250ºF.  3½ hours later, 9 hours total, the IT reached 185ºF.  Pulled the Hickory Smoked Corned Beef and rested under a foil tent for 20 minutes.  The Hickory Smoked Corned Beef Flat Cut Brisket turned out wonderful.  The meat was tender and moist with a pleasing smoke flavor.  Next time I may take the Corned Beef Brisket to 195-200ºF.

If I were to do it again I would smoke it at 225ºF for 2 hours and then bump the temp to 250ºF until the IT reaches ~ 200ºF.  This corned beef was back in 2011 and I've learned a few things since then 

I agree with Art that it's a different taste than more traditional recipes.  SWMBO wasn't too keen on this method and prefers the more traditional New England Boiled Dinner method where the corned beef is boiled and then in the same water the cabbage, potatoes, onions, carrots, and celery are boiled 



Click on photo to enlarge ...

   

[Hub]

Oooooooh yessssss.  See my recipe for pastrami (it's EZ) in either my section or the recipe section.  GOOD EATS!

Hub

[CDN Smoker]

Good looking plate Pete

[teesquare]

Oooooooh yessssss.  See my recipe for pastrami (it's EZ) in either my section or the recipe section.  GOOD EATS!

Hub

Sho nuff!!!! I ha e used it and I love Hubs recipe

[pz]

Due to my ignorance, I did not know smoked corned beef is essentially pastrami when I did mine some time ago (a forum member pointed that out when I did my first post).  I'd like to try Hub's recipe now that I know a little more about smoking meats. This is plain 'ol store bought corned beef:
We soaked the corned beef in water for about an hour to remove some of the salt and did not use the seasoning packet - turns out that we might have soaked longer if we wanted to eat it plain, but on sandwiches and hash it was really good.  Traeger at 225F = don't know the IT - just cooked it until it looked done.  It was good enough so that I always look for on-sale corned beef when I'm at the store, and will always purchase it.



Made really good corned beef hash - sliced it thick, then chopped it for the hash.  My wife tells me that we need to save about half of each smoked corned beef we make just for this purpose - she's spoiled now and won't eat the canned hash any more 

[Northshore]

I have smoked several corned beef (commercial) after soaking and rubbing with spices, as per recipes I have found on forum. After smoking I steamed the meat.  As pastrami it was quite good.  The meat shrinks a fair amount.  For me if I want corned beef I cook it the old fashioned way.