Q and A: Making corned beef and preserving potatoes

Making corned beef

We are butchering our beef in a few weeks and I would like to make corned beef from the brisket using your recipe from the book Recession Proof Your Pantry. My question is, can I use a plastic bucket with an airtight lid instead of a crock? (I don’t have a crock.) And can you tell me what the purpose of the cloth over the top is?

Gayle Rush
Eugene, Missouri

A food-grade plastic bucket should work fine; I use one for kraut. And I DO have a crock. The bucket is lighter and easier to carry around! The cloth is to keep debris and insects out of the bucket and hold the dampness in the crock. Be sure to place a sterilized plate over the beef and a weight on top of that to keep the meat totally covered by the brine. You also might consider having the brisket or part of it smoked. Our friend, Andy Gunderson, smoked our last brisket and it was SO good! — Jackie

Preserving potatoes

We have an abundance of red potatoes and would like to freeze and can some of them for later use. We want to freeze things like french fries, sliced potatoes, and hash browns and then home can anything we can for long term.

Charlie
Bronson, Michigan

To freeze French fries, first fry them in hot grease, in a deep fryer, at 370 degrees until just light brown. Drain, cool and pack. It works well to spread them out first on a cookie sheet to freeze singly, then package them up for storage. This way they won’t clump together.

To freeze potato slices or other raw potato products, first blanch them for 5 minutes in boiling water, then chill in cold water, drain, and package.

Canning potatoes is a good use of smaller potatoes. I often just scrub and can my little baby potatoes whole with the skins on. Then, later if you want to take the skins off, you just need to squeeze and twist them and the skin slides right off. You can also can up potato chunks or dices. They can up quite nicely. Don’t over-boil them before canning them up or they’ll get mushy. You can either boil whole potatoes for 10 minutes before packing into hot jars or pack dices/slices raw in the jars, then add boiling water and process. Potatoes are processed at 10 pounds pressure for 35 minutes (pints) or 40 minutes (quarts). If you live at an altitude above 1,000 feet, consult your canning book for directions on increasing your pressure to suit your altitude, if necessary. Enjoy your bounty of potatoes! Great feeling, isn’t it? — Jackie