If you are looking for the best, easiest way to make baked corned beef, you have come to the right place. For years I couldn't figure out how to make corned beef just the way I liked it to taste, but as it turns out, it's really simple: I now know how to cook corned beef in the oven!
Before we get into all the specifics of how to cook corned beef in the oven, let's start with the basics:
What is corned beef?
At the most basic, corned beef is a piece of beef brisket that has been cured in rock ( "corn" ) salt and usually something else that you don't really want to know about, like delicious, delicious nitrates and nitrites.
Look, in seriousness, I don't love nitrates and nitrites either, but once a year ... well I make an exception.
Because corned beef is delicious.
Now that you know what corned beef is, let's move on to the how of it all. If you'd rather watch how it's done, check out this video:
How to cook corned beef in the oven:
- Rinse the corned beef off with water and pat dry
- Rub the corned beef in your favorite mustard ( dijon for me )
- Sprinkle whatever magic seasoning was provided to you in the package of corned beef on the top ( fat side up )
- Wrap tightly in foil and place on an ovenproof pan with high sides so the moisture released during cooking doesn't overflow
- BAKE!
How long to cook corned beef in the oven?
The time to bake corned beef in the oven until it is tender, juicy, but still sliceable, is really simple to remember! Bake it for one hour per pound, and if your corned beef isn't a "perfect", even weight, round up to the quarter pound for times. For instance, a 2.65 lb corned beef should cook for the same time as a 2.75 lb corned beef: 2 hours and 45 minutes.
Here's some common times to spare you any math:
- 1 lb corned beef : bake 1 hour
- 2 lb corned beef: bake 2 hours
- 2.25 lb corned beef: bake 2 hours 15 minutes
- 2.5 lb corned beef: bake 2 hours 30 minutes
- 2.75 lb corned beef: bake 2 hours 45 minutes
- 3 lb corned beef: bake 3 hours
- 3.5 lb corned beef: bake 3 hours 30 minutes
- ... you get the idea!
Don't forget, once you take the corned beef out of the oven, it needs to REST before you slice into it, otherwise it will end up dry.
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I love to have oven baked corned beef and cabbage!
So make sure to make some sautéed cabbage to go with your corned beef. It's a great vegetable side dish for St Patrick's Day!
Baked Corned Beef in the Oven
Ingredients
- 1 package corned beef seasoning packet included
- ¼ cup dijon mustard
- 1 sheet foil heavy duty preferred
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and place a large piece of aluminum foil in an oven-proof dish with high sides like a Pyrex dish.Remove the corned beef from the package. Set the spice packet aside. Throw out any other packaging. Rinse the corned beef with cold water, pat dry, and set it on the foil in the dish, with the fatty side on the top.
- Rub ¼ cup of mustard all over the corned beef ( top, bottoms, sides )
- Open the seasoning packet, and sprinkle the seasoning on top of the mustard-rubbed corned beef. The seasoning only needs to go on the top of the meat, not all over.
- Tightly wrap the corned beef with the foil it's resting on. Place pan with the foil wrapped corned beef into the oven. Bake for 1 hour per pound of corned beef.
- Once the beef has cooked, remove it from the oven and open the foil. Optional: Broil the corned beef for 5 minutes, or until the top begins to crisp. After all cooking ( broiling or not ) has completed, let the corned beef rest for 10 minutes before transferring it to a cutting board. Slice the meat against the grain and serve with sautéed cabbage.
Douglas says
1st time using this recipe but not the last. Follow the recipe to the letter and Old boy so delicious. I made this for Corned beef and Reuben sandwich.
janiann says
excellent best way to do this i would put a size limit of 3 lbs in a foil in the recipe for those who have no cooking experience.i would love to see the steer that had a 15 pound brisket though
Jess says
13 lb fresh beef brisket pickled for 9 days. Followed instructions exactly and baked for 12 hours; we prefer rare. I smelled a slight burning smell but thought it was probably the juices burning. The beef was nearly inedible it was so overcooked to a crisp. It was so heartbreaking I nearly cried. My guests ate it but it was nothing the way I had hoped. I re-looked at the recipe to see if it should have been slow cooked with water or something but no.
Kerry says
What a shame! I feel for you. The temperature this recipe reommends is too high to begin with. I am foil roasting a 3 pound corned beef right now, just as I did last weekend for St. Patrick's Day. I use 300 F, and i brush the brisket with smoke flavored browning sauce first (you can used slightly watered down Worcestershire sauce). Then I saute the brisket in a large fry pan with a tablespoon each of avocado oil (which doesn't scorch) and butter. I do it about 5 minutes on each side over a medium high burner until both sides are golden brown. Then I place the roast in the foil "bowl" fat side up and coat it with thick layer of Mailleurs or other full seed brown mustard. i also thin slice 4 or 5 garlic cloves and lay them onto the mustard coating.
Then I pour the browned cracklings and juice from the frying pan over the meat and tightly close up the foil -- very important that the moisture doesn't escape or it will dry the meat out. You can also use the clear plastic roasting bags that seal with a glue strip (they sell them for roasting turkeys). The moisture MUST stay inside for this kind of slow cooking to be effective.
For the amount of meat you had, it should have been split up in 3 or four packages rather than trying to roast the thing whole (maybe you did that anyway). That "one hour per pound" instruction is ludicrous for larger roasts. Even as a single slab, 5 hours probably would have been enough.
12 hours was WAY too long to roast yours. I would check it after 4 hours with a meat thermometer. Then again every half hour until it reached 170 F inside.
For a 2 pound roast I go 2 1/2 hours at 300F. For the 4 pound one I am doing right now I will probably only go 3 hours before I check it with the thermometer
Kerry says
Also, I always soak a brined brisket in cold water for an hour at least before prepping to slow roast -- this removes some of the salt.
Nana Ellen says
Yep, this is the way to go, good hot, even better sliced next day for sandwiches.
Pam says
This was delicious! Not a mustard fan at all but oh that made it!