Salt Beef with Pickled Cucumbers
The humble sandwich gets an upgrade from Hannah with finger licking salt beef — lunch times will never be the same again. Using brisket (a tough cut from a super hard working part of the animal, and traditional for salt beef) in the sous vide would make the meat meltingly tender, and a very generous stint in a scented brine would ensure it stayed super juicy during cooking and seriously tasty when eaten. I cooked this brisket at 67°C for 3 days and it was soft and full of delicious flavour, but I missed the rareness of the beef, so next time will do it at 61°C for 2 days and see how that works. To serve, we ate it on rye rolls with Jarlsberg cheese and crispy, sweet and vinegary home pickled cucumbers. (BRINE RECIPE TAKEN FROM THE TELEGRAPH)
Ingredients
| 2 kg | beef brisket, pierced with a skewer several times all over | |
| 275 g | soft light-brown sugar | |
| 350 g | coarse sea salt | |
| 2 tsp | 10 ml | black peppercorns |
| ½ tbsp | 7.5 ml | juniper berries |
| 4 | cloves | |
| 4 | bay leaves | |
| 4 | sprigs of thyme | |
| 4½ pints | 2.1 l | water |
| 1 | cucumber (for pickling) | |
| 8 tbsp | 120 ml | rice vinegar |
| 4 tsp | 20 ml | salt to sprinkle |
| 4 tbsp | 60 ml | white sugar |
| ½ tsp | 2.5 ml | salt |
| — | A few black peppercorns |
Instructions
FOR THE CUCUMBER
- Start by taking the cucumber and peeling it in stripes down its length, making it look stripy, then on a mandolin finely slice the cucumber into discs.
- Place them into a bowl and scatter with the salt, leave for 15 minutes.
- While that's happening combine all the other ingredients into a jug, stir thoroughly for a little while as the sugar takes a while to totally dissolve.
- After 15 minutes rinse the cucumbers and pop them into a jar or tupperware box; once all in there pour the liquor over them, cover and put in the fridge. You can eat them straight away but they're better after a day, and they'll keep for up to about 5 days.
FOR THE BEEF 5. Into a saucepan large enough to hold the ingredients, combine all of them apart from the beef and bring to the boil. Let it boil for 2 minutes, stirring, then turn the heat off and let it cool completely. 6. Unroll the brisket and place it into a cleaned container big enough to contain it and all the brining liquor, and when the brine is totally cold, place it in over the brisket and pop into the fridge for 4 to 5 days. 7. After the 5 days, preheat the sous vide to 67 or 61°C, rinse the brined beef under cold water for a few minutes, pat it dry with kitchen paper and then place it into a pouch and seal on a hard vacuum. Sous vide for 3 days. 8. Remove from the sous vide and either eat warm straight out of the pouch, or chill down and eat chilled from the fridge.
Serve on rye rolls with Jarlsberg cheese and the pickled cucumbers.
Published with the kind permission of The Kitchen Alchemist. From https://www.sousvidetools.com/toolshed/recipes/salt-beef-pickled-cucumber/