Sigh... Corned beef. I can never get excited for this stuff. Salty boiled beef served with soggy boiled cabbage + carrots and water-logged bland potatoes... YUCK! Sounds ratchet, doesn't it?
To honor the Irish side in Diddy's famÃlia, I make my version of this classic boiled dinner. There is just one simple rule I follow to make this meal:
The corned beef is the only boiled menu item.
The beef is so tough, it requires boiling a long time before you can do anything with it. There's no getting around it. A crock pot makes this step a breeze. I put the beef into the pot with boiling water. Set the timer. And forgetaboutit. In 5 hours, the meat is perfectly done.
Since I don't eat much of the meat, the veggies take center stage at this dinner. I serve the traditional vegetables (potatoes, cabbage, etc.) prepared in a different way. This way I still get to cook something because throwing everything into a pot and boiling it to near death is not cooking.
So what did we have for St. Patrick's Day 2015? Our menu:
Brown Sugar + Mustard Glazed Corned Beef
Browned Butter Cabbage
Herbed Cold Potatoes
Beef was fork tender. Sides complemented the salty beef nicely. Cabbage was sweet and rich with umami; the potatoes were cool and tart.
There is a lot of leftover corned beef (can't say the same for the sides). Diddy is going to grub on corned beef sammiches for the rest of the week. And I say, "Have at it," while I have another helping of cucumber banchan.
