My Next Experiment

[Oldman]

Last week I asked my wife to pick me up some pepper beef from the deli. Well it was good. However, at $11.00 per pound I said whoa~~!

After looking the net over for a few days I could not find anything that would give me this same type of meat. So I started to give it some thought.

This is what I'm done.
First I created a marinade. It consist of the following:

Much fresh ground black pepper (Tellicherry Mountain--man is this stuff better than the pepper corns in the supermarket.)
A fair amount of ground white pepper
A small amount of red pepper flakes
About 1 tsp of MSG
A tablespoon of onion power
A tablespoon of worcestershire powder
About 2 tablespoons of salt
1/2 gallon of distilled water

I mixed this all up real good. The water now looks like it has the specific gravity of 2.

2-1/2 pound bottom round. I took my hand meat tenderizer and inserted it 1/4 to 3/8 of an inch all over the whole piece of meat.
Place meat into marinade and is now in the frig.

<b><font color="red">Edit:</font id="red"></b> Going to leave it 3 days. I changed my mind. Took it out at 30 hours. Now I've heavily covered it pepper and wrapped in plastic. I'm going to leave this in the frig for another 2 days.<b><font color="red"> End Of Edit.</font id="red"></b>

When it comes out I will strain the pepper from the marinade, add more fresh ground black pepper to that and cover the meat with it until all you can see is black pepper.

I'm kicking around the idea of smokin' it for 2 or 3 hours. More than likely I will use oak. After that it will be slow cooked until I get to the temp of 130F. Then I will place it in a pre-heated passive cooker (FTC) but without the foil, and the towels will be wrapped around the outside of the passive cooker. I've knotched this box I use as a passive cooker so I can close it and yet run a probe into the meat. Once it hits 145 F I will take it out. Allowing it to cool. Then back into the frig to chill before I slice it for sandwiches. [:p]

If this marinade's flavor holds I expect great things to come from this. The flavor of this mainade, at this moment, is to die for... just flat out--outstanding~~!

I think it is just strong enough to impart a tastefull pepper flavor through out the meat without killing the beef's own flavor. Let's face it, this type of marriage is the trick to a great deli styled pepper beef. Neither flavor can over power the other one. They have to complement each other.

Olds

[jaeger]

....plus you will save yourself 8-9 bucks a pound!!![;)]



<font size="4"><b>Doug</b></font id="size4">

[JJC]

Sounds great, Olds--let us know as soon as you get the results! [:p]

John
Newton MA

[Oldman]

Follow up.

After removing the beef from the solution I covered it for 5 days in heavy pepper.

Smoked 2 hours pecan. Final temp before eating was 145 F.

While this is a nice tasting piece of beef and I will certainly do it again it is not quite what I wanted. The flavor I was looking for was good for about the first 5/8" after that the beef took over. Now this is ok as I view it as a new type of sandwich meat to work with and enjoy. I can see it having a place in one of my multi item sandwiches.

The next one I'm going to do I will leave in the solution for 6 days, but I think I will remove the onion powder.

Nevertheless, as I said this turned out to be a great tasting piece of meat. I can see it blended in a pastrami or corned beef sandwich. Or sliced real thin--dried and then wrapped around a green onion with cream cheese between it and the onion placed on my next "meat" tray.

My best success and my worst failures have all come out of my head. I'm not unhappy with this at all, rather pleased. Its just not what I was looking for. [;)]

*Olds goes to the store tomarrow and starts another one.*

Olds

[Bad Flynch]

&gt;The flavor I was looking for was good for about the first 5/8" after that the beef took over.&lt;

Get a syringe and pump some of the brine into the meat. That will fix the problem. You will end up experimenting how much, but many of the curing recipes I have allow for a 10% by weight pump.

B.F.

[Oldman]

<blockquote id="quote"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica" id="quote">quote:<hr height="1" noshade id="quote">Get a syringe and pump some of the brine into the meat. That will fix the problem. You will end up experimenting how much, but many of the curing recipes I have allow for a 10% by weight pump.
<hr height="1" noshade id="quote"></blockquote id="quote"></font id="quote">Thanks...but I've already given thought to that. I don't believe it is the way this type of beef is done.

Olds

[BigSmoker]

Great idea Olds.  I love peppered beef.  One question.  Your hand tenderizer is it a jacard?

Jeff



Some say BBQ is in your blood, if thats true my blood must be BBQ sauce.

[Oldman]

BS it looks sorta like this one:


Now I did not go deep at all.

Olds