Corned Beef

[jennyjoan]

Anybody tell me the difference between corned beef mentioned in America and our corned beef in the UK.

[theprof]

There's a need for some clarification of earlier posts here.

Gelatine has been said in earlier posts to be an additive in canned corned beef in the UK. That's not true. The main purpose for added gelatine in foodstuffs in simple terms is to hold the product together. It's unnecessary in canned corned beef.

Both Fray Bentos and Princes use a process where the corned beef with about 3% cooked beef are cooked and effectively liquefied during the process. The fat from the cooking process rises to the surface of the mix in the same way that fat rises in one of those separating jugs with a spout at the base used in making stock. The remixed liquefied product is poured into the cans, the cans are sealed and the contents cooked again for a short time. The can is allowed to cool vertically resulting in the fat rising to the top of the can and congealing - exactly as it does in a gravy jug. The fat is always more prevalent at top of corned beef in a can because the can is allowed to cool upright with the larger base in contact with a chilled conveyor belt for around 30 minutes, although you'll get the odd can on the belt that was inverted.

Gelatine is unnecessary. EU food regulations have a directive about gelatine that we still stick too despite being out of the EU. I do accept that historically, corned beef was often made locally by adding a pigs trotter to cooking process to extract the collagen which helped set the corned beef but the process is not used nowadays in Europe commercially.

Gelatine and Collagen are both declarable additives in food products and would have to be declared on the label on cans. It can be seen from the second link provided by pastafreak that there is no such declaration.

Incidentally, corned beef has also been made in the UK for a good few years now and can be bought loose at most deli counters in supermarkets and in sealed packs. It's made from British beef and again, the UK manufacturer does not use gelatine in the manufacture of the product.

For some unfathomable reason, there seems to be a lot of misinformation on the Internet about gelatine and corned beef. Don't believe all you read - I was paid some years ago to supervise some microbiological research at the Fray Bentos factory and I've witnessed production at first hand.

My colleagues in the Food Science industry tell me that they are asked to test for gelatine in canned corned beef on a regular basis. They've promised to let me know when they find some.

[TonyV]

Always have a battered sausage when I get fish from local chippy

[bhg481]

With the demise of open-fires corned-beef-legs have become a rarity.

[theprof]

Nah, be posh bhg481 and call it erythema ab igne.

I had many elderly aunts in my family as a child and I vividly recall them hoisting their skirts up an warming their legs in front of open fires. Their legs looked horrendous as a consequence.

[Old_Geezer]

So that's what Bully Beef is supposed to be. Never realised.
Typical Americans, refusing to speak English.