Slicing Hot Pastrami/photo by Donna Turner Ruhlman
Making pastrami at home is just one extra step from making corned beef. Corn your beef, then coat it with a mixture of black pepper and ground coriander and smoke it in your smoker or kettle charcoal grill. (updated from long ago.)
I've done this with short ribs, and love them because they've got the perfect meat-to-fat ratio.
While I've published the corned beef recipe from my book Charcuterie, I haven't really talked about smoking strategies at home. I recommend two different methods: stove top and in a kettle grill. Stove-top smoking is easy with an inexpensive ($43) Cameron smoker. I bought one a few years ago and it works great for bacon and would work great for this brisket. Briskets require long low heat though, and this is tricky on a stove top smoker. So this is what I do when I want both smoke and long slow cooking. I smoke the meat for a couple hours. Then I transfer it to a 200 to 250 degree oven to finish. With this pastrami, I would cook it in the oven for 30 to 60 minutes to bake the smoke on, and then cover it with foil and ½ cup of water and cook it for another 2 to 4 hours till it's tender (the water is to make sure there's plenty of steam).
What's more fun, when the weather is good, is to smoke them in a kettle grill. For this, you need wood chips (sawdust is fine for stovetop smokers, but for coals, chips are by far the best, giving long steady smoke). Soak the chips well, build a medium fire on one side of the grill, put your sodden chips on the coals and put your brisket on the cool side of the grill. Cook it covered for a few hours, adding coals and chips as needed. Or finish it as above in a low oven, covered. (OpenSky is offering a deal on wood chips today, four different kinds, including olive and cherry. I swear this was total coincidence because I've been planning this post for a while!)
Smoking is a great and fun way to flavor foods. I love the cherry or any fruit wood for bacon, and a hardwood like maple for this brisket.
(And PS, I don't know who gave that pickling spice recipe two stars, but it is from Polcyn, published in Charcuterie, and it is killer!)
Homemade Pastrami
Ingredients
- ¾ cup Morton's kosher salt (or 200 grams of any salt)
- ½ cup sugar (100 grams)
- 2 tsp pink curing salt (10 grams)
- 5 cloves garlic, smashed with the flat side of a knife
- 2 tbsp pickling spice (store bought or see below)
- 1 five-pound beef brisket (the fattier the better)
- 1 tbsp black peppercorns, toasted in a skillet and ground in a mill (ok to use store-bought ground)
- 1 tbsp coriander seeds, toasted and ground in a mill
Instructions
- In pot large enough to hold brisket, combine 1 gallon/4 liters of water with kosher salt, sugar, sodium nitrite (if using), garlic and 2 tablespoons pickling spice. Bring to a simmer, stirring until salt and sugar are dissolved. Remove from heat and let cool to room temperature, then refrigerate until chilled.
- Place brisket in brine, weighted with a plate to keep it submerged; cover. Refrigerate for 2 days if it's thin, a third day if it's thick.
- Remove brisket from brine and rinse thoroughly. Refrigerate it for another day uncovered (this is best, to let cure equalize, but if you can't wait, that's ok too).
- Combine the pepper and coriander and coat the brisket with it. Smoke and cook the brisket, till tender, as described above. This will keep for a week in the refrigerator. Steam it to reheat or reheat covered in a microwave (gently). Slice thinly to serve.
Pickling Spice
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons/20 grams black peppercorns
- 2 tablespoons/20 grams mustard seeds
- 2 tablespoons/20 grams coriander seeds
- 2 tablespoons/12 grams hot red pepper flakes
- 2 tablespoons/14 grams allspice berries
- 1 tablespoon/8 grams ground mace
- 2 small cinnamon sticks, crushed or broken into pieces
- 4 bay leaves, crumbled
- 2 tablespoons/6 grams whole cloves
- 1 tablespoon/8 grams ground ginger
Instructions
- Lightly toast the peppercorns, mustard seeds, and coriander seeds in a small dry pan, then smash with the side of a knife just to crack.
- Combine the cracked spices with the remaining ingredients, mixing well. Store in a tightly sealed plastic container or glass jar.
You recommend twice as much curing salt as is safe. Please check your amounts.
Otherwise a nice recipe.
I use a ratio of .0025 pink salt, which is standard. So 10 grams/2 teaspoons pink salt for 4000 grams water (along with 5 pounds of meat) is appropriate. What is your reasoning? This recipe has worked for more than a decade with no safety issues.
That said, it probably could be reduced without compromising flavor.
I have made this Pastrami for years and continue to love it. I tend to use apple wood to smoke it as I had an apple tree and saved the prunings. As I get older I some times cheat and start with a store bought corned beef, point cut only. After cooking, I dry it uncovered for 24hrs in the fridg, cover with cracked pepper and coriander, then smoke it in an offset smoker for 4 hrs. A gift from heaven.
Giving it my first go. Thanks Ruhlman. I went down the rabbit hole during 2020 and read Polish Sausage Making By Adam Marianski and surprisingly became fascinated with the history of it all. My first child is one now and I’m coming back up for air and getting after it! Always heard about you from Bourdain and always been a fan of whatever show you are on. You really should have your own show. YouTube is your friend. If you need a good sound guy let me know. Thanks
thanks James. sorry for the delay in responding. I DO need a sound guy! Cant even get iphone to pick up earbuds mic when doing videos.
I've made this twice as well as many other recipes from Charcuterie and they are all excellent. The garlic sage brine chops have now become a weekly staple.
Question regarding this pastrami, if I am doing a full packer brisket, say 15 lbs, can I triple the full recipe?
I'm also curious about the relatively short brine time, most other corned beef recipes call for 7-10 days of brining time. Is it shorter due to higher brine concentration?
for fifteen pounds, I'd double the brine (or triple if you wish and do a seven day brine with a third day in the fridge out of the brine to equalize salt.
Awesome, thank you Michael!
Just to clarify, you mean after seven days of brining let the brisket sit in the fridge uncovered (i.e. not in brine) for eight more hours?
correct. lmk how it turns out!
I have you book, Charcuterie. I am making a big batch of pastrami. I currently have about 25 lbs of brisket and venison haunch defrosting. I am guessing it will be 20 lbs when I am done trimming. I am looking at tripling the recipe for the brine. I do my brining in a 5 gallon bucket. Am hoping it will all fit. Any suggestions?
just use your common sense! It should work tripling recipe. (sorry for the delay!)
and you've likely already done this. how did it work?
The venison came out exceptionally nice. The husband of the neighbor who made the rye bread for sandwhiches pronounced it "Magnifcent!" I did lots of trimming and ended up with 18 lbs of meat. I doubled the (5%) brine recipe and soaked it for 7 days. I am always so shocked at how cold my hands get when moving the meat in the brine! I put a strip of beef fat inside the 2 pieces of venison where the leg bone had been. I divided the haunch along fore and aft muscle groups to give me a better pocket to tuck the fat inside.
I used my little 4 rack electric smoker with alder wood pellets. Final temperature was between 150 and 160 degrees, depending on the rack height.
I did not boil nor steam any of it. I just slice it thin across the grain and go with that.
I think that covers it.
Thank you for replying. I imagine the comments here could be on 50 different recipes in any given day.
I've used this recipe for years a base recipe, altering the pickling spice and the brine seasonings with other aromatics as desired. My current batch of brine includes adding fresh rosemary, sage, and thyme from the garden to the pickling spice, and I've added juniper berries to the pickling spice mix.
This recipe and others from Charcuterie have been broadened and deepened both what and how we cook
nice additions!
This brine is less strong with a shorter brine time than what you have in the book. Did you decide that the book recipe was too salty?
I cant remember why i changed it. It's not too salty because excess leaches into the cooking liquid.
I've made this recipe numerous times and I am never disappointed. This time I tried a few things differently. I used Eye of Round as is was on sale. since it is pretty large at the fat end, I brined three days and one day to equalize. I now have a real smoker so that helped. I smoked it with hickory for 3 hours at just 200F. Then I bagged it directly off the smoker and sous vide cooked it at 132F for the next 30 hours. It was an outer world experience! So tender from the sous vide and smoky with the toasted coriander and pepper complementing all of it. This is definitely a repeat event!
I've made your recipe several times, it's as good as Katz, which is saying a lot. Thanks for the inspiration, Pal.
thanks!
I started a batch of corned beef yesterday (3/9/22) using your recipe in Charcuterie -- great book, btw!--in order to have it ready for a St. Patrick's Day meal with the relatives. Can I leave the meat in the brine until the 17th? How long can the meat remain in brine before using?
It's best to take it out of the brine when it's finished. It will keep for a week or two refrigerated before cooking.
I'm approaching the end of brining an #11 brisket using this recipe. After drying for a few days in the fridge, I'll be ready for smoking and cooking. What are your thoughts on smoking and cooking time? What internal temp am I looking to achieve after smoking? Thank you.
Hi Michael,
I've made this recipe while living in the States, its absolutely fantastic! Thank you. I can't get fatty brisket in Portugal, so I'm going to use picanha. My question is, will your recipe amounts work with 2 picanhas that will be 2 1/2 lbs each?
if they're roughly the same weight, yes!
Hello Michael, I have been looking at different pastrami recipe’s trying to find one that would easy, see I grew up in California and would go to The Hat since living in LA (lower Alabama) I could not find anyone that has a pastrami sandwich, After reading the ingredients and all the comments I decided to try yours, and I was not disappointed. I will be doing this again soon
Hi Michael,
in your book Charcuterie the pastrami recipe calls for 8 teaspoons of pink salt for 5 lbs of meat. Is that correct? Is it safe. I have a brisket in brine right now using that ratio.
Thanks,
Bill Malcolm
that does seem like a lot, but I believe it's for a gallon of brine? so most of it will remain in the brine. don't have access to the book but it's 20 years old and we've had no injuries so far!
The first recipe I used! Four the cooking time after smoking would you cook it to a specific temperature or just use time? I’m cooking larger batches of different piece sizes so trying to figure out when it’s done. Thanks!
Feel, till fork tender.
I'm a big fan of this recipe, but I find myself with only Mortons tenderquick; any suggestions on substituting it?