Slow Cooker Corned Beef

Fake St. Patrick's day was celebrated this weekend across the United States by people drinking tons of cheap beer dyed green and shots of poor quality Irish Whiskey. Whether or not you chose to participate in such a debacle is your own business but for real St. Patrick's Day, which is celebrated March 17, you might want to consider celebrating by coming home to a hot pot of corned beef stew.

The great thing about corned beef is you can cook the bojangles out of it and it's still good.The meat just gets more and more tender as it goes on. This stew is prepared from a store-bought corned beef but I suppose you could corn your own if you got the time and salt. Here is what you will need for mine:

1 corned beef of whatever size
4-6 potatoes peeled and quartered
2 carrots, peeled and chopped into large chunks
1-2 onions peeled and halved
1 can beer

First thing you wanna do is open the bag of corned beef and drain off all the salty liquid in there. Some people rinse it too but I fear losing too much salty goodness. I chuck that in my slow cooker along w/ the seasoning packet of spices that comes w/ it. My quantities on the veggies is a little vague because I basically just peel and chop until I have the rest of the pot full.

Good times! But we're not done yet. There is one more critical ingredient:

It doesn't have to be Hamm's but it has to be beer. Some people use Guinness, operating under the erroneous assumption that it is good beer and that it is Irish. Well, some of it is Irish, the extra stout and that is a good beer but a bit too bitter to be used for cooking in my opinion. The stuff that comes in cans and bottles w/ the little widget to make that thick white head is made in Canada and tastes like Budweiser mixed w/ coffee and vomitus. Avoid! I think cheap, tasty beer like Hamm's, Stroh's or Pabst works well in this situation. Nice mild beer flavor to compliment the meat. So just let your corned beef chill w/ a can of brew.

So here is where we get to the extremely difficult part: you have to turn your slow cooker on low and let it sit for about six or so hours while you go ahead and do whatever else you do. Corned beef is kind of like pulled pork where you actually want to overcook it to make it tender and, like pulled pork, it should be shredable once finished. A lot of people say that it's more tender if you cook, let it sit overnight and reheat for the next day and, it's true that corned beef makes for some of the best left overs in the world, but the real reason it's better is that the process of reheating further overcooks the meat and let's it get super tender. The only thing you want to avoid is cooking the potatoes until they turn into complete mush.

Serve it up on a plate and reserve any left over juices to use as a base for another stew or another corned beef sometime. A lot of times the corned beef will just tear into pieces w/o even having to use a knife:

If you are a fan of black Budweiser that smells faintly of vomit and think such a thing is authentically Irish, let me know about it in the comments!

Beef Stew à la Mommel

Here at the Chicago chapter of TFK, it is universally accepted that my mom makes the best beef stew. However, when I asked her how to make it she mentioned things like onion soup and brown gravy mixes and other things I don't keep around the house. Over time, I developed a recipe that substitutes some vegetable broth in for these things though I have used beer and red wine instead to equal success.

Here's what you need to make this lovely beef stew:

2-3 lbs beef
4 russet potatoes
4 carrots
2 large onions
2 bay leaves
14 oz vegetable broth
1 tbsp oil or butter
~2 tsp salt
~1 tsp pepper
2 bay leaves

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit. 

You start out w/ a hunk of meet like this. I bought this sucker labeled as a london broil but the grain of the meat was all wrong making it a perfect candidate for stew.

Trim excess fat and cube into pieces about one inch to one and half inches per side. I like nice big chunks that you have to cut w/ a knife and fork before eating.

 

You'll want to brown these chunks in about a tablespoon of oil or butter until they look about like this:

 

Use a cast iron pot or other oven safe one. This is the same dish you'll make the stew in. You want to get all the little brown bits in there. Brown bits are a fun ride to flavor country. I use an enamalized cast iron dutch oven. It wasn't free but it's great.

In the meantime peel and chop the carrots, onions and potatoes to about this size. Again, I like to keep them pretty big.

Chuck all this into the pot w/ the browned chunks of meat, pour in 14 oz of vegetable broth and add bay leaves and salt and pepper to taste. The ingredients don't need to be covered in liquid. As it cooks the beef will release juices and make more broth. Cook for about an hour to ninety minutes. Fun chefs go by their nose on this one. Once the house starts smelling great, give it about ten minutes and check to see if the potatoes and meat are cooked. Check every ten minutes after that if it's not. This is one dish that can be a little overcooked so don't worry. The meat will just get falling apart tender. The end result is quite soupy but I still serve it up on a plate. When mom's not looking, I slurp the juices out.

It's not pretty but it's delicious. I do a lot of variations on this. Frequently I use other root veggies like parsnips and turnips and generally I add some celery too. Red wine mixed w/ water is great substitute for the stock as is beer as I mentioned. If you use beer, you can be creative as long as you don't use anything too bitter (no IPA, no American Pale Ales or big stouts). Belgian beers work great and my favorite might be big, malty German bocks. I normally stick w/ just salt and pepper and let the veggies and cooking liquid shine but herbs and spices are also an excellent addition. Have fun and post a comment to let us know how it turned out if you cook it.