Baked Honey Mustard Corned Beef

My husband Jason is half Irish, so I enjoy celebrating his heritage by making an Irish feast each year for Saint Patrick’s Day. Traditionally I make boiled corned beef with cabbage, potatoes and Irish soda bread. This year I wanted to try something different with the corned beef by adding more flavor and tenderness to the meat while changing up the side dishes a bit. So I decided to make a baked honey mustard corned beef recipe.

On a recent trip to Palm Springs we stopped and had some great hot corned beef sandwiches outside the city that dish inspired me to oven roast the corned beef. This recipe is great because it’s simple and takes about the same amount of time as boiling. The corned beef is smothered with honey dijon mustard and sprinkled with dark brown sugar, then oven roasted for a few hours until tender and juicy.

The great thing is you can get creative with the sauce by adding your favorite ingredients and not lose the entire flavor in the liquid!  I roasted about 2 pounds of meat and still had a half of the roast leftover. My husband is excited for using the leftover for corned beef and hash, and corned beef sandwiches!

I served this years Saint Patrick’s Day feast with sautéed cabbage and carmelized onions, Yukon gold mashed potatoes, and roasted brussel sprouts. I also baked an Irish soda bread with cherry and almonds that is a sweet twist on traditional recipes. To end the feast with some sweets, try my recipe for Irish coffee profiteroles with chocolate whiskey sauce, the perfect Irish combination. Happy feasting!

Tip #1- What is corned beef? Corned beef is either brisket or round, they are tougher meats that benefit from slow moist heat cooking. The meat is cured in a brine for several days in a solution of salt, sugar, pickling spices and a curing salt like tinted cure mix, Insta-cure #1 or prague powder 1 (a mixture of salt, sodium nitrite, and pink coloring). Osmosis is the process which occurs during wet curing to equalize the concentration of salt solution from the outside to the inside of the meats cell walls, which is why meats are more flavorful after the curing process. The salt physically moves with water from the outside of the membrane to the inside cell walls over time.

Tip #2- Curing is an essential food preservation technique with salt being a main ingredient. Salt helps draw out water, blood, and impurities in foods, while reducing spoilage from microbes. When salt enters the cell walls of a food, harmful pathogens that may be present cannot survive the harsh conditions. Food preservation techniques have provided means to prolong shelf life and enhance flavors of foods like bacon, pickles, ham, sausages and cheeses that we all love enjoy!