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Bolled Corned Beef
Soak over night if very salt, but if beef is young and properly corned this is not necessary; pour over it cold water enough to cover it well, after washing off the salt. The rule for boiling meats is twenty-five minutes to a pound, but corned beef should be placed on a part of the stove or range where it will simmer, not boil, uninterruptedly from four to six hours, according to the size of the piece. If to be served cold, some let the meat remain in the liquor until cold, and some let tough beef remain in the liquor until the next day, and bring it to the boiling point just before serving. Simmer a brisket or plate-piece until the bones are easily removed, fold over, forming a square or oblong piece, place sufficient weight on top to press the parts closely together, and set where it will become cold. This gives a firm, solid piece to cut in slices, and is a delightful relish. Boil liquor down, remove the fat, season with pepper or sweet herbs, and save it to pour over finely minced scraps and pieces of beef; press the meat firmly into a mold, pour over it the liquor, and place over it a close cover with a weight upon it. When turned from the mold, garnish with sprigs of parsley or celery, and serve with fancy pickles or French mustard. -Mrs. S. H. J.
Two dishes in one entry: a simmered corned brisket, and a pressed or jellied beef made from the trimmings and reduced cooking liquor. The first instruction is the one that matters.
- Simmer, never boilThe direction to keep the pot where it will simmer uninterruptedly is the whole technique. Hold the water at 180-185F, with the surface barely moving; a rolling boil squeezes the muscle fibres and gives you dry, stringy meat no matter how long you cook it.
- Timing against the clock, and against a forkThe recipe gives four to six hours "according to the size of the piece," and that is the better guide than the twenty-five-minutes-to-the-pound rule it quotes in passing. The beef is done when a fork slides in and out with no resistance.
- The overnight soakCorned beef bought today is cured with measured salt and sodium nitrite and is far less salty than a 19th-century barrel piece. Rinse it well and skip the soak; taste the liquor after an hour and add water if it is too salty for the sauce you intend to make from it.
- Plate-pieceThe plate is the cut below the ribs, roughly what is now sold as beef navel. Ask for a whole packer brisket or navel end; supermarket flat-cut brisket is boneless and leaner and will not need the bones removed.
- Cooling in the liquorLetting the meat cool in its own broth is sound practice and worth doing whether or not you serve it cold, since the piece reabsorbs moisture as it drops in temperature. Cool it quickly in a shallow pan or an ice bath and get it into the refrigerator once it is below about 70F rather than leaving it out overnight as written.
- PressingFor the folded brisket, wrap it in plastic or parchment, set it in a loaf pan or between two sheet pans, and load it with a few cans or a foil-wrapped brick. Six to eight hours in the refrigerator sets it firm enough to carve in thin slices.
- The jellied moldThe reduced liquor gels because of the collagen released from the bones and connective tissue; reduce it by about half, strain it, and chill a spoonful on a saucer to check that it sets before you pour it over the minced meat. If it stays loose, reduce further or add a teaspoon of powdered gelatin per cup.
- Keeping and servingThe molded beef is a refrigerator dish, not a pantry one; use it within three or four days. A 5 lb brisket serves eight hot, and the trimmings will fill a standard loaf pan. "French mustard" here means a smooth prepared mustard of the Dijon type, as distinct from dry English mustard powder mixed at table.
"Corned" has nothing to do with corn the grain: it refers to the coarse grains, or corns, of salt used on the beef, and the term was already old when Buckeye Cookery appeared in Ohio in the 1870s. Salting was how a farm household made a whole animal last, and a book like this one, assembled from contributed recipes and signed with initials, is organized around that logic of using everything. Note that this single entry moves from the prime boiled piece, to the cheaper bony plate pressed into a firm slicing loaf, to the "finely minced scraps" set in their own jelly, with the cooking liquor itself treated as an ingredient rather than waste. Pressed and jellied meats of this kind were standard cold-table fare through the late nineteenth century; the recipe's own "delightful relish" suggests such a dish could be both an economy and something offered with some pride.