As a kid growing up, my family had a Sunday tradition after church of having pastrami sandwiches after church. I think that’s where my love of pastrami began, and how disappointed I have become over the years trying to find good, thick cut stripes of pastrami like my mother used to get from the local grocery store.

During my adventures in smoked barbeque, I have tried many recipes for smoked pastrami and finally found one that adding my own twists; I feel is the best I have ever had! What I would like to do in this article is share with you the process of preparing smoked pastrami.

When preparing pastrami there are a couple of choices of beef cuts that I have found that will make wonderful pastrami. Those cuts of beef are: Whole beef brisket, brisket flat, or London broil. For this article I will use a whole beef brisket as my example.

What I do first is trim the brisket of any hard fat areas. I also trim almost all the fat off the brisket. Remember were making a pastrami not a smoked brisket so the process is different. After trimming the brisket I inject it with a special brine mixture that will help transform the brisket into a beautiful corned beef.

Brine Injection

• · 31/2 Cups. Water
• · 2 Tbsp Tenderquick (or your choice of curing salts)
• · 2 Tbsp Brown Sugar
• · 2 ts Granulated Garlic

Prepare the above brine and place in your refrigerator until cold. While waiting for the brine to cool, make the following rub which will be the first of three rubs you will make for this process.
Rub 1

• · 3 Tbsp Freshly ground Black Pepper
• · 1 Tbsp Ground Coriander
• · 1 Tsp Ground Thyme
• · 1 Tbsp Granulated Onion powder

Mix the above rub and take out 2 Tbsp to mix with your next rub. Save remainder of this rub for when you smoke your pastrami on the big day. Prepare Rub 2 to be applied to your brisket.

Rub 2

• · 1/4 C. Tenderquick
• · 2 Tbsp Brown Sugar
• · 1 Tbsp Paprika
• · 2 Tbsp Garlic Powder
• · 2 Tbsp Rub #1 from above

Once you have the rub ready, inject your brisket with the brine you prepared earlier. Try to inject as much of the brine into the brisket as you can. Once you have finished injecting the brisket, and its holding as much of the brine as possible, coat it with rub 2 all over.
Cover and refrigerate the brisket for five days. If you can’t wait this long you can remove it after three days, but I feel waiting the full five days gives the pastrami a much fuller flavor. Once in the fridge turn the brisket at least once a day from top to bottom. Now this is the hardest part of the whole process because as time goes on and you turn this brisket it’s going to look and smell great!

At the end of the waiting period, take the pastrami out, because over the past few days the brisket has transformed! Rinse off the pastrami and allow it to soak in cold water for at least one hour. This will help remove the salts and rub that helped with the transformation. Don’t skip this step; it will make the difference between your eating a corned beef or our goal of smoking pastrami. While the pastrami is soaking, prepare your smoker for the cook as well as prepare rub 3 for the smoking debut.

Rub 3

• · The remainder of rub 1 from our first preparation day.
• · 1 Tsp Paprika
• · 1 Tsp Garlic Powder
• · 1 Tbs Freshly Ground Coarse Black Pepper (or more, if you like your pastrami with a heavy peppery crust on the outside)

Remove the pastrami from its soak and apply rub 3 all over it. Now place that bad boy on your smoker!

Now we wait. Remember were not smoking a beef brisket and our pastrami does not need to smoke as long. We need to smoke it at 225-250. I use a mix of Oak and Sugar Maple for flavor. If desired you can, use a spray bottle to mist the pastrami with apple juice, Dr. Pepper or any other type of basting spray you would prefer to help keep the pastrami moist.

When the pastrami reaches an internal temperature of 140, I remove it from the smoker, add 1 cup of apple juice and then double wrap it with aluminum foil before I return it to the smoker. Let the pastrami continue to smoke until an internal temperature of 160-165 is reached (about 1 1/2 -2 hours), then remove it and allow it to set for 45 minutes to an hour.

This will allow the juices to settle down. When ready to carve, remember to carve it as you would a brisket, against the grain. You can slice it as thin or as thick as you like. I use my automatic meat slicer for this.

I hope you enjoy this recipe as much as my family and I do. In our opinion this is the best pastrami you will ever have, and will be an often requested, and most anticipated smoked meat you will prepare. Please do not hesitate to contact me with any questions or comments you have regarding this article.

Chuck Marting (Bossman)