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Corned Beef Hash with Beets
When preparing Corned Beef hash, add one-half as much finely chopped cooked beets as potatoes. Cold roast beef or one-half roast beef and one-half corned beef may be used.
A variation note rather than a standalone recipe: it assumes you already have the book's corned beef hash in hand. The proportions are the whole instruction, so the technique is where the attention goes.
- The proportionsHalf as much beet as potato, by volume of chopped cooked vegetable. A workable batch: 2 cups chopped corned beef, 2 cups chopped boiled potato, 1 cup chopped cooked beet. That serves three or four.
- Chop, do not grind"Finely chopped" means knife-cut to roughly a quarter inch. A food processor turns cooked potato to paste and cooked beet to slurry, and the hash will never form a crust.
- Beets bleedOnce the beets go in, everything turns pink, which is the point of the dish. Toss beets in last and lightly if you want visible pieces rather than a uniform rose color.
- Cold potatoes onlyFreshly boiled potato is too wet and too soft. Boil them the day before and refrigerate, or use leftovers; cold starch holds its shape and browns instead of steaming.
- SaltCorned beef carries most of the seasoning. Taste before adding any salt, and season with pepper first. If you substitute all roast beef as the note allows, you will need to salt properly.
- The crustPress the hash flat in a heavy skillet over medium heat in a good film of fat and leave it alone for eight to ten minutes before turning. Constant stirring is the usual reason home hash ends up mushy.
- Beets, then and nowThe original assumes beets boiled at home. Vacuum-packed cooked beets work; canned pickled beets do not, as the vinegar throws the whole dish sour.
- ServingA poached or fried egg on top is a common accompaniment, often with a sharp condiment: horseradish, mustard, or a pickle.
Corned beef hash reddened with beets is what New England calls red flannel hash, the name generally traced to the coarse red woolen undershirts worn by farmers and loggers through the northern winter. It is a second-day dish built on a first-day one: the New England boiled dinner of corned beef, potatoes, cabbage, turnip and beets left exactly the right leftovers, and the hash was the accepted way to finish them. The book treats the variation as too obvious to need its own recipe and files it as a single line under the plain hash. The instruction that roast beef may stand in, whole or half, reflects the same habit of mind: the method belonged to whatever cold meat the household actually had.