Does anyone here eat corned beef?

I cannot seem to find any without added sugar, I have tried looking for both tinned versions and at the deli and they all have sugar.

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DANDR

Starting weight: 196 lbs
Current weight: 149 lbs
Goal weight: 130 lbs

I googled "corn beef recipe" and came up with how the "corn" is put into the beef. Yup, there's sugar, all right, both in the brining solution and brown sugar is in the recipe itself. Perhaps this is one food you may have to pass on. Maybe Char or Betty can come up with some way to make it LC! A LC Reuben sounds good!

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Alida
5'1" ~ 59 years old
Highest weight: 165
Atkins 7/10/2004
160/126/125
RE-DO, January 2008:
167/162/135

If someome has a method to make it that would be ace, will give it a try!

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DANDR

Starting weight: 196 lbs
Current weight: 149 lbs
Goal weight: 130 lbs

I've eaten corned beef a couple times with no bad effects. Check the label to see what the carb count is. But according to fitday there is very little carb pers serving. Maybe the boiling process eliminates much of the sugar.

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my blog

Here is a recipe for making corned beef that I found on the web. The brine mixture contains 3 Tbls of brown sugar. The recipe does not specify if the brown sugar is packed or unpacked. According to the USDA data base the carb count on the sugar is 40 if packed, or 26 if unpacked. Even if the carbs in the sugar are transfered to the meat, for 10 pounds of meat the carb count per pound would only be 2.6-4.0 which should not be much of a problem.

How to make corned beef
Making your own corned beef is easy and economical. Beef and pork can be cured in a salt brine and preserved for months without losing quality.

THE INGREDIENTS
For 10 to 12 pounds of meat you will need 1 and a half cups of coarse or non-iodized salt (kosher salt is good to use but regular granulated salt without the iodine works just as well), 3 tablespoons of brown sugar, a generous tablespoons of cracked black peppercorns, 2 teaspoons of allspice berries, cracked, five or six sprigs of fresh thyme, a teaspoon of powdered sage, a teaspoon of paprika, 7 or 8 bay leaves, broken into small pieces, a small coarsely-chopped onion, a small chopped rutabaga, a chopped carrot, and 6 cloves of garlic, either crushed or finely minced. For pork, add two tablespoons of fresh juniper berries, broken with the flat of a knife. If you are only doing one tongue or roast, reduce the amounts of ingredients accordingly.

THE METHOD

The corning process can be done in a large stone crock but is really much easier if you use freezer zip-lock bags. Assemble enough bags to hold all your different cuts of meat, one cut to a bag. Mix all the ingredients together in a small bowl, except the juniper berries. Place all the meat in a roasting pan and cover all sides with the salt mixture, rubbing it in well. Put each piece of meat into a bag and divide the remaining salt mixture among the bags. If you are doing a piece of pork, add the juniper berries to that bag. Remove as much air as possible from each bag and seal. If you have one of those vacuum sealers, this is a perfect use for it. You want the meat to be bathed in the salt mixture at all times.

Pack all the bags into a large bowl or crock and weight them down under a plate and about 10 pounds of weight (use canned tomatoes or the like). Place in the bottom of the fridge. Check the bags in a few hours. The juice should be running freely from the meat. Massage each bag to work the cure into all the crevices of the meat. Repack into the container, re-weight and return to the fridge. Turn the bags and massage daily to make sure the cure is getting into all sides of the meat.

If a bag breaks, transfer the meat into a new bag with all the juices and about a quarter cup of salt. Leave the meat to cure for at least two weeks, three is better, before cooking one.

Before cooking, you will have to soak the meat in several changes of fresh cold water to remove the excess salt. The longer the meat is cured, the longer it will take to soak. Twenty-four hours should be enough. The meat will lose its rubbery texture and begin to feel like fresh raw meat again. Because there is no saltpeter in this curing mix, the meat will not be bright red. Don't worry, you didn't do anything wrong, this is what it should look like. If you really want it to look like purchased corned meat, find saltpeter at a pharmacy and add a half-teaspoon to the cure, but this is not necessary and only adds questionable, perhaps carcinogenic, substances to your food. There is no good reason to add nitrates to your food other than asthetic ones. Get used to grayish-brown corned beef, it is better for you!

COOKING

Put the refreshed meat in a pot and cover with water. Add a carrot, some celery stalks with tops, a small onion, several sprigs of Italian parsley, some sprigs of fresh thyme, 4 bay leaves, and 5 cloves of garlic, flattened with the side of a knife. Bring to a boil and reduce to simmer. Skim off any foam that rises for the first few minutes then cover partially with a lid and cook at the simmer until the tongue or roast can be pierced easily with a fork. This will take 2 to 3 ? hours, depending on the size of the meat cut.

If you will be serving the corned beef or tongue cold, allow to cool in the cooking liquid. When cool, the tongue should be removed and the rough skin carefully peeled off. It will usually come off in one or two large pieces and this is MUCH easier if the tongue is still slightly warm. Discard the skin. Also remove any small bones from the large end of the tongue and discard. Put the meat in the fridge for several hours or overnight. Tongue or corned beef should be sliced thinly and served with good rye bread or rolls with mustard. Either corned tongue or other cuts of beef can be heated and served as hot sandwiches too.

Sugar in the brining process is curative as well as a flavoring agent. There is SO little per serving, I don't worry about it, much like any sugar in my cured bacon. That tiny bit doesn't really affect me.

I know purists who disagree! But compared to the 3 or more regular Cokes I used to consume every day, plus all the white bread, potatoes, rice, and sweets - it's just not something I think affects my overall health, particularly since I don't eat those things daily anyway!

JMHO and 2 cents worth of course!

Char

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i buy corned beef brisket from the meat counter at any grocery store, you have to cook it (not the case with canned and deli) and it is so good with cabbage!

This thread makes me want to make some corned beef. And cabbage is on sale this week! must be fate.

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Is there any way I could substitute the sugar in this recipies. I am not having any sugar at all, I come out in brown skin spots when I eat sugar.

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DANDR

Starting weight: 196 lbs
Current weight: 149 lbs
Goal weight: 130 lbs