Just got my first smoker

[Sled21]

(03-01-2021, 02:40 PM)fredtoast Wrote: Any of you guys ever smoked corned beef?

Have any of you ever brined a brisket to make it corned beef?

I LOVE pastrami.  Isn't that just smoked corned beef?  Or is there another step involved?  

My parents raised their own beef.  I always wanted to try to make my own corned beef, but the meat was already frozen by the time my parents got it back from the slaughterhouse.  I didn't think thawed frozen meat would work as good as fresh.  Then one time they slaughtered and processed a calf themselves that had broken its leg.  They ground the entire thing into hamburger.  But I took a couple of large roast cuts and got a brine recipe and instructions off the internet.  I don't know what I did wrong but the stuff was too salty to eat.  I tried soaking the brine out of it, but nothing worked.  It ended up as dog food.

Funniest part of the story was my attempts to buy saltpeter (potassium nitrate).  Every place I asked about it they wanted to know what I wanted it for.  I guess they thought I was trying to make explosives.

Never made corned beef, and to tell the truth I've never even heard of anyone brining beef. I've seen it injected, and I inject pork butts, but bringing beef is a new concept to me....