Slow Cooker Honey Mustard Corned Beef and Cabbage

Happy St. Patrick's Day!  Did you make corned beef and cabbage today?  A lot of people are intimidate by it; thinking that it's complicated and hard to make.  It's totally not!  I already have a recipe for Slow Cooker Corned Beef and Cabbage on my blog, but I have found a recipe I like even better.  It is adapted from A Year of Slow Cooking.  This one is better because it is simpler.  And simple is always best!  All you do is throw a hunk of corned beef in your slow cooker and slather it with a honey mustard glaze.  The glaze permeates the meat and makes it so tender and delicious.  

 Slow Cooker Honey Mustard Corned Beef and Cabbage

Ingredients:
4 lb. corned beef brisket (point cut)
2 tbsp honey
¼ cup brown sugar
2 tbsp Dijon mustard
½ large head cabbage

Directions:
Use a 6-quart slow cooker. Unwrap the corned beef, and remove the seasoning packet, and trim as much of the fat from the meat as you can. Rinse and pat dry.  In a small bowl, make a paste of the honey, brown sugar, and mustard. Rub this mixture on all sides of the meat. Place the meat into the slow cooker and cover. Cook on low for 8 to 10 hours, or until meat pulls apart easily with a fork. 

Halfway through cooking, chop the cabbage into chunks and place it in the slow cooker, on top of the corned beef.  Using tongs, toss the cabbage so that it gets coated in the cooking liquid.  Replace lid and continue cooking on low.

Remove corned beef to a platter and slice.  Remove cabbage with a slotted spoon and place alongside corned beef.

Makes 6 servings.

I serve this with Traditional Irish Soda Bread, of course.

I like to get the point cut for this.  It has more fat and is beautifully marbled.  You want to cut off as much of the visible fat as you can before you cook it.  I have found that kitchen shears work better than a knife for this.  You might need to remove some more of the visible fat after it has cooked. By then, it's easy to remove.  You can certainly use the flat cut for this recipe too.  It will not be quite as fall-apart tender though.

This beef comes out so amazingly tender.  It literally just falls apart.  I love that.  And the cabbage has a surprising sweetness to it.  It's all just delicious. 

For more great St. Patrick's Day food offerings, click on "St. Patrick's Day" on the category list to the right. ----------------------------->

What I'm Reading Right Now

Mary Poppins

by P.L. Travers

Doctor Sleep

by Stephen King

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Traditional Irish Soda Bread

Here's another great recipe that is good to have for St. Patrick's Day.  I am not much of a baker, and haven't mastered homemade bread yet, but last year I decided to try soda bread on St. Patrick's Day.  We were having friends over for a feast so I thought it was the perfect time to try it.  I wanted to do a traditional soda bread recipe, not one that added a bunch of stuff like raisins and whatnot.  I got a great sounding recipe in my email from Fine Cooking and it seemed perfect.  Four ingredients and no kneading?  That sounded like a bread recipe I could handle.  

Irish Soda Bread

Ingredients:

1 lb. (3½ cups) all-purpose flour; more as needed

¾ tsp. baking soda

1 tsp. salt

2 tsp dried herbs (optional)

1½ to 1¾ cups buttermilk

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 400°. 

Place all of the dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl. Make a well in the center and pour in 1½ cups of the buttermilk. Stir the buttermilk into the dry ingredients. If necessary, add more buttermilk 1 tbsp at a time until the dough just barely comes together. The dough should be soft; don’t overwork it.

Turn the dough out onto a well-floured surface and pat into a round about 6¾” in diameter and 1½” high in the center.  Invert the round so the floured side is on top. With a thin, sharp knife, score a cross on the dough about ¼” deep and extending fully from one side to the other.  

Transfer the dough to a stoneware baking sheet and bake for 35-45 minutes or until the bread is browned and sounds hollow when tapped on the bottom.

Cool to room temperature on a rack, about 2 hours, before slicing and serving.

Makes 4 servings.

I was so amazed at how well this bread turned out the first time I made it.  It was gorgeous!  I was very shocked that I could make such beautiful bread with so little effort.  It was a huge hit with our friends and I have since made it several times.  I made five or six loaves of it for our church's bake sale last fall and they sold for $6 each.

While this bread is awesome with just the four basic ingredients, I will sometimes add some dried herbs to it to change it up a little bit.  So far my favorite add-ins have been: Mural of Flavor, dried dill, Toasted Onion, Tuscan Sunset, and lemon pepper.  The possibilities are endless.

I only made two slight changes to the original recipe.  It called for half as much salt but some reviewers said it needed more.  I think it's perfect with the 1 tsp.  If you are adding extra seasonings, make sure they are salt-free, or reduce the amount of plain salt you use.

I also had to adjust the cooking temperature a bit.  The original called for baking it at 450 for 15 minutes, then reducing to 400.  But I had problems with that; the crust was hard and crunchy on the outside, but the inside was a little underdone.  So I have much better results baking it at 400 the entire time.  I still get a nice crunchy outside, but this way the inside is cooked through too.

This recipe is so handy to know.  It doesn't require a lot of pre-planning or prep time.  It's easy peasy and a total crowd pleaser.  I'm making it again tomorrow for this year's St. Patty's Day feast!

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Irish Cream Bundt Cake

It's been a rough couple of weeks around here.  I had grand plans for sharing several St. Patrick's Day recipes with you, but sickness has been running through our house for a week and a half now and we're just starting to feel kind of normal again.  Blah.  No fun!  I haven't cooked for a week!

But I thought I should be able to eke out at least one St. Patty's Day recipe for you.  Last year I made two bundt cakes for our church's women's Bible study just a few days before St. Patrick's Day.  I shared one of them last year, my Chocolate Mint Bundt Cake.  Now here is the other one.  It is a simple bundt cake made with a yellow cake mix and some instant pudding mix.  Very moist and delicious.  Irish cream is baked into the cake, and made the star of the yummy glaze.  You can use the real deal Irish cream, or you can use Irish cream flavored coffee creamer.  Great either way.  It's adapted from one I found at Allrecipes.

Irish Cream Bundt Cake

Ingredients:

1 box yellow cake mix

1 (3.4 oz.) box instant vanilla pudding mix

4 eggs

½ cup water, divided

½ cup vegetable oil

1 cup Irish cream liqueur or Irish cream coffee creamer, divided

½ cup butter

1 cup sugar

Directions:

Preheat oven to 325°. Grease and flour a 10” Bundt pan. (I used Pam for Baking.)

In a large bowl, combine cake mix and pudding mix. Mix in eggs, ¼ cup water, oil and ¾ cup Irish cream. Beat for 5 minutes at high speed. Pour batter into pan.

Bake in the preheated oven for 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the cake comes out clean. 

When cake is nearly done baking, make the glaze.  In a saucepan, combine butter, remaining ¼ cup water and sugar. Bring to a boil and continue boiling for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in remaining ¼ cup Irish cream.

When cake is done, allow to cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then invert onto the serving dish. Prick top and sides of cake with a toothpick. Place about ⅔ of the glaze in the bottom of the bundt pan.  Carefully place cake back into the pan while still warm to soak up the glaze.  Spoon remaining ⅓ of glaze onto the bottom of the cake.  Let sit for a few minutes.  Then remove from pan and place back onto the serving dish.  Allow to cool completely before slicing and serving.

Makes about 12 servings.

This cake is really delicious and was a big hit with the ladies at Bible study.  It is very moist.  The glaze is just the perfect consistency and lends just the right touch of Irish cream flavor.  

I have to spend most of the day tomorrow catching up on work in the church office that got put on hold earlier this week while being sick, but maybe I will be able to share another recipe perfect for St. Patrick's Day on Saturday.

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Chocolate Mint Bundt Cake

 Happy Monday, everyone!  How was your St. Patrick's Day?  We had a great day.  I dressed my girls up in St. Patty's Day tees for church and then we had friends over for an Irish feast.  I made Slow Cooker Honey Mustard Corned Beef, Slow Cooker Cabbage, Irish Potato Cakes, Traditional Irish Soda Bread, Green Punch, and Irish Cream Brownies.  It was lots of fun.

Last week I was signed up to bring goodies to the Women's Bible Study at my church.  I decided to make bundt cakes, as I bought a bundt cake pan at a garage sale last summer for 50 cents, but had never used it.  Since it was a few days before St. Patrick's Day, I went with that theme. I made an Irish Cream Bundt Cake, and this Chocolate Mint Bundt Cake.  They were both really good.  I thought I would share the chocolate one with you today.  It's adapted from Creations by Kara.  Even though I made it for St. Patrick's Day, it would be great any time of year.


Chocolate Mint Bundt Cake

Ingredients:
1 box devil’s food or chocolate cake mix
4 eggs
1 cup sour cream (I used low fat)
½ cup water
1 (3 oz.) box instant chocolate pudding
½ cup oil
1¼ tsp peppermint extract, divided
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
4 oz. white chocolate squares
½ - 1 tsp vegetable oil
Green food coloring

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350°.  Coat a bundt cake pan with baking spray.

Combine cake mix, eggs, sour cream, water, pudding, oil, and 1 tsp peppermint extract. Beat until well mixed. Stir in chocolate chips. Pour into bundt pan. 

Bake for about 45-50 minutes. Cool for 5-10 minutes in pan, then dump out onto a cooling rack. Cool completely. 

Melt white chocolate squares in the microwave. Stir in remaining ¼ tsp peppermint extract and a few drops of green food coloring.  Add enough oil to make it runny enough to drizzle. Drizzle over the cake. Let sit until chocolate drizzle sets.  (Best made the day before serving).

Makes 16 servings.

It was a big hit.  It is really dense, moist, and very chocolatey.  So good!  I love the chocolate chips in there. Sorry I forgot to snap a pick of an individual slice so you could see the inside.  It got eaten up too quickly!

 

 This would make a great Christmas cake by using red food coloring instead of the green.  Very versatile.  I'm really glad I got that bundt cake pan.  I know I'll be making this again!

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Colcannon with Bacon and Cheese

St. Patrick's Day is coming up and I still have Irish food on my mind.  Last year I created a great colcannon recipe.  If you're not familiar, colcannon is a dish traditional to Ireland made up of cabbage and potatoes.  I think it is traditionally made with mashed potatoes, but there are hundreds of different varieties out there in internetland.  Some use cubed potatoes, some shredded, some have spinach, some have cheese, etc.  I read a whole bunch of them and then decided to come up with my own recipe.  This one has shredded hash brown potatoes, cheese, and the best part: bacon!


Colcannon with Bacon and Cheese

Ingredients:
2 tbsp bacon fat
½ large onion
½ small head cabbage, chopped
30 oz. package frozen shredded hash browns, thawed and dried
1 tsp salt
4 strips bacon, cooked and crumbled
½ cup heavy cream
1½ cups shredded cheese, divided

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350°.

Saute onion and cabbage in bacon fat.  Add potatoes, salt, bacon, cream, and 1 cup cheese.  Put into 9x13” baking dish.  Cover and bake for 20 minutes.  Uncover, top with remaining cheese and bake an additional 10 minutes.

Makes 8 servings.

Nope, not healthy in the least.  But boy, is it yummy!  I know the idea of a dish containing potatoes and cabbage can be a real turn-off to a lot of people, but adding bacon and cheese can really sweeten the deal!  This would make a great addition to your St. Patrick's Day feast this year.

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Secret Recipe Club: Irish Cottage Pie

Today is reveal day for The Secret Recipe Club. The Secret Recipe Club is a group of food bloggers who secretly make one of someone else's dishes and post them all on the same day at the same time.  It's really fun, choosing a recipe to make, making the recipe, then reading about everyone else's recipes.  It's a great way to "meet" other bloggers and check out some great blogs that you never knew about before.

This month I was assigned Paulchen's Food Blog, written by Astrid.  Astrid is an avid reader, cookbook collector, and cat lover in Vienna.  Her blog is an eclectic collection of recipes.  I found several that sounded really good.  I'm still fully in soup-obsessed mode, so her Broccoli and Cream Carrot Soup really caught my eye.  (I love how it uses coconut milk instead of heavy cream; definitely trying that one soon!)  I am also very intrigued by her Chicken Tagine with Honey, Pears & Cinnamon.  She also has some great desserts over there.  The Chocolate Banana Decadence Cake she made for her brother looks amazing.  But as soon as I saw a category called "Irish" I knew which direction I was heading!  I love cooking according to the seasons and holidays and I have definitely been thinking about St. Patrick's Day lately.  So I jumped at the chance to try Astrid's Irish Cottage Pie.  It did not disappoint!  

Irish Cottage Pie

Ingredients:

1 tsp olive oil

½ large onion, diced

1 lb. ground beef

2½ lbs. potatoes

2 tbsp flour

¾ cup stout beer

1¼ cups beef stock

1 cup frozen peas

1 cup matchstick carrots

¼ tsp dried thyme

Milk and butter

Directions:

Sauté onion in olive oil until tender.  Add ground beef and cook until browned.  Drain off any grease. Sprinkle the flour over the mixture and stir and cook for 3 to 4 minutes.  Add beer and beef stock and bring to a boil.. When it starts to thicken, reduce heat.  Add peas, carrots, and thyme and cook 10 to 15 minutes, or until carrots are soft.

Meanwhile, peel, chop and boil the potatoes for 20 minutes or until soft.  Drain the potatoes very well until completely dry. Mash until smooth and free of any lumps.  Add butter to the mashed potato, taste and adjust the seasoning.  Add enough milk to make the mash very soft (heavy mash will not float properly on top of the ground beef mixture).

Pour beef mixture into a 9x9” casserole dish.  Spread the potatoes on top of the meat and brush the tops of the potatoes with melted butter.  Place under broiler for 5-7 minutes or until golden brown on top.

Makes 4-6 servings.

I didn't change very much about Astrid's recipe.  I think I used more beef, just because I like using a nice even pound.  Makes it easy.  I also replaced some of the beef stock with stout beer just to make it a little more interesting.  The beer taste wasn't overwhelming at all, just gave it a nice depth of flavor.

This was so good!  It really hit the spot on a cold winter day.  My five year old at all of hers without complaint (well, except for the onions, but she ate them anyway).  

The beef mixture.  Yum.

 Comfort food at its best!

 Thanks so much for a great recipe, Astrid!

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Irish Cream and Coffee Muffins

Here is a lovely muffin recipe to get your St. Patrick's Day started off right.  It's my adaptation of one I found on Food.com.


Irish Cream and Coffee Muffins


Ingredients:
2 cups flour
4 tsp baking powder
1 packet Starbucks Via instant espresso
1 tbsp hot water
¾ cup brown sugar
¼ cup canola oil
½ cup Irish cream
½ cup milk
2 eggs
Powdered sugar, to dust tops


Directions:
Preheat oven to 400°.  Spray a muffin tin with baking spray and set aside.


Place flour and baking powder in a small bowl.  Set aside.


In a large mixing bowl, dissolve instant coffee in the hot water.  Add the brown sugar, oil, Irish cream, milk and eggs.  Stir to combine.  Fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just incorporated, being careful not to overmix.  Batter will be lumpy.


Spoon mixture into prepared muffin tin and bake for 12 – 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.  Remove from oven and dust with powdered sugar.  


Makes 12 muffins.

These are some tasty muffins!  The amount of Irish cream is just right, giving them a lovely flavor.  And I love  the powdered sugar on top.  I've never done that with muffins before, but it's just right for these.

I always use decaf Via in my baked goods so that no one is restricted from eating them, (I am making three dozen of these babies for church tomorrow), but use regular if you want a nice little pick-me-up in your muffin.

Here are some of my other St. Patrick's Day recipes for your enjoyment.

Slow Cooker Corned Beef and Cabbage

Corned Beef and Cabbage Soup

Irish Cream Brownies

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

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Corned Beef and Cabbage Soup

St. Patrick's Day is coming up this weekend.  Are you ready?  I think it's so fun to cook according to seasons and holidays. It's a really great way to mix things up and make dinner a little bit more interesting.  That's why I was so excited when my friend, Joan of Chocolate, Chocolate, and More invited me to be a part of her St. Patrick's Day Blog Party today.  It's just seven food bloggers all getting together and posting some kind of St. Patrick's Day related recipe at the same time.

Before I get to my recipe, here's what everyone else has to share with you:

Debi at Recipes for my Boys made Colcannon and Irish Stew

Carrie at Carrie's Experimental Kitchen made An Irish Feast

Kimiko at Beachside Baker made a Shamrock Shake

Melissa at Chin Deep made Apple Bramble Cake with Bushmill's Custard

Michaela at Affair from the Heart made Irish Cream Cheesecake

Joan at Chocolate, Chocolate and More made Grasshopper Pie

I can't wait to check out all this yummy Irish and/or green food! :)

As soon as I got Joan's email, I knew what I wanted to make.  I saw a recipe for Corned Beef and Cabbage Soup in the March issue of Food Network Magazine.  It looked pretty simple and I couldn't wait to try it.  I made a few changes to the original recipe (of course!), and I think my version is even more simple.  Here's how I made it.

Corned Beef and Cabbage Soup

Ingredients:

2 tbsp olive oil

1 medium onion, diced

1 cup matchstick carrots

¼ tsp ground allspice

1 (15 oz.) can petite diced tomatoes, drained

3 cups low-sodium beef broth

4 cups green cabbage, chopped (about ½ small head)

½ lb. potatoes, peeled and diced

¾ cup quick-cooking barley

4 cups water

½ lb. cooked corned beef, cut into thin strips and chopped

Kosher salt

Directions:

Heat oil in a large soup pot over medium-high heat.  Add the onion, carrots, and allspice and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are slightly softened, about 5 minutes.

Add the tomatoes, beef broth, cabbage, potatoes, barley, and water; cover and bring to a boil. Uncover, reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer until the potatoes and barley are tender, about 20 minutes. Stir in the corned beef and season with salt.

Makes 6 servings.

This is one hearty soup!  I love how it is packed with four different veggies AND potatoes and barley AND the corned beef.  It's a complete meal in and of itself.  Although that didn't stop us from enjoying some freshly baked rolls with it! 

The original recipe called for pulsing the veggies in a food processor before adding them to the pot, but I don't have a full-sized food processor, so I just diced my veggies and added them that way.  Again, I highly recommend the convenience of matchstick carrots.  They are so perfect for soups.  

The original recipe said that this makes 4 servings, but I think it makes WAY more than that.  I put down 6, but it could very easily be even more than that.  It would be a great soup to make for a crowd.  Also, the barley and potatoes will soak up some of the broth when you put the leftovers in the fridge, so keep that extra 1 cup of beef broth to add to it before reheating.

This would be a great soup to make the day after St. Patrick's Day if you have made a nice corned beef roast, since it calls for cooked corned beef.  I bought a roast, and cooked it simply according to the package, then sliced it up.  The original recipe called for only  ¼ lb. of meat, but that didn't look like very much, so I doubled it.  Glad I did because it was perfect.

So if you don't have any plans for what to make on St. Patrick's Day, check out the blog posts listed above for some great recipes.

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

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Irish Cream Brownies

This is the dessert I made on St. Patrick's Day. I'm not usually a fan of frosted brownies (they remind me of school cafeterias), but the only irish cream brownie recipes I could find had frosting. I got this recipe from Food.com.

Irish Cream Brownies

Ingredients:

1 box brownie mix

¾ cup irish cream, divided

½ cup oil

2 eggs

½ cup butter, softened

2 cups powdered sugar

Directions:

Heat oven to 350°. Grease the bottom of a 9x13” baking dish.

In a large bowl, combine brownie mix, ½ cup irish cream, oil, and eggs. Beat 50 strokes with a spoon and spread in greased pan. Bake for 20 minutes. Do not over bake. Cool completely.

In a small bowl, beat butter until light and fluffy. Beat in powdered sugar and remaining ¼ cup irish cream. Add more irish cream if too thick. Spread over cooled brownies.

Makes 20 brownies.

They aren't very pretty, but they taste pretty darn good. I don't think I had ever actually had irish cream before. I've had irish cream flavored coffee creamer, but not the real thing. I didn't buy the Bailey's; it was too expensive. I found another brand (still imported from Ireland), for about half the price.

The original recipe called for a chocolate drizzle on top, but I didn't think it was necessary. They're pretty rich enough as it is!

I made these after enjoying a lovely dinner of corned beef and cabbage.

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Slow Cooker Corned Beef and Cabbage

This is the result of my first ever attempt at corned beef and cabbage. I think it turned out really well. I used a slow cooker recipe because my daughter has gymnastics on Thursday evenings and I have no time to make dinner. I found this recipe on Food.com.

Slow Cooker Corned Beef and Cabbage

Ingredients:

3-4 lbs. corned beef brisket

7+ onion, chopped

¼ cup cider vinegar

¼ cup brown sugar

1 tbsp Dijon mustard

¼ tsp ground cloves

1 medium head of cabbage, cut into wedges

1 apple, sliced

¼ - ½ tsp caraway seeds (optional)

12 oz. dark beer

Directions:

Place corned beef brisket and any seasonings included in your slow cooker. Top with onion. Whisk together the vinegar, brown sugar, mustard, and cloves and pour over top. Add the cabbage wedges and apple slices and caraway seeds if using them. Pour beer over top.

Cover and cook on low for about 7 hours or high for about 4-5 hours.

Makes 6 servings.

It turned out really well. Since I had never made corned beef before, I had no idea how to know when it was done, especially since it is red even when fully cooked. I put mine on high because I didn't get it into the slow cooker until around noon. I checked it at 4:00 and the cabbage was in good shape (cooked, but with a little bite left to it), but I had no idea if the beef was done or not. So I turned it down to low and it cooked another 2 hours that way. At 6:00 the cabbage was slightly more done than I like it, but still edible. And the corned beef was perfect.

I didn't have the caraway seeds so I left them out.

This is the beer I used. It was super dark, and I don't like beer, so I honestly thought that I wasn't going to like this dish. But it didn't taste like beer at all. I was really surprised.

I heard that it's traditional to serve corned beef and cabbage with potatoes, but I didn't really know how to prepare them. I peeled them and cut them into large chunks and boiled them. Then on the serving platter, I poured some of the liquid from the slow cooker over them. That worked out well.

After Lena went to bed, Jim and I rounded out the day with Irish Cream Brownies.

I'm sure I'll be making this again next St. Patrick's Day!

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