Corned Beef & Cabbage Twist

The older I get and the more experienced I get in the kitchen, the more particular I’m becoming about the types of food I like to prepare at home, and taking on more advanced types of food preparation. Holly and I had an amazing St. Patrick’s Day meal at home. I toyed for a few days if I wanted to do the preparation of making corned beef at home, the traditional way, with brining for five to ten days prior. We ultimately opted for a chuck roast since we both have been overly busy with work these past few weeks.

I make my own fennel salt which consists of crushed fennel, celery seed, dried orange rind, dried garlic, finest quality sea salt, dried parsley and a little bit of crushed red pepper. I also add some bread crumbs to mellow some of the intense flavors, but still allowing them to come through without being overbearing. I generously seasoned the meat with my homemade mixture than let it roast in the crock pot all day. We came home to a very intense and aromatic smell in the house reminiscent of all those Sunday dinners of my childhood.

We accompanied the roast with roasted baby red potatoes and Brussels sprouts. When we traveled to France last autumn, I picked up a ton of custom olive oils when we visited Nice and other towns down on the French Mediterranean. I broke open the orange and lemon infused olive oil, and used this with the organic seasoning blend we use on all our roasted vegetables.

I received a comprehensive Cooks Illustrated / American’s Test Kitchen cook book for my Birthday from my mother-in-law. I’ve been making items out of this cook book weekly. For our holiday meal, I also decided to make an extremely flavorful traditional soda bread recipe to go with the roast and veggies. I enjoy making simple and flavorful meals with best quality ingredients.

I’m looking forward to finding a few more recipes to try this upcoming weekend.