My first first attempt at corning beef was little bland

[BC Buck]

Was planing on using Pops 6927 brine recipe. Realized had no space for gallon container of brine in refrigerator. Thought no problem will scale down recipe.
2.5 lb brisket flat about 1.5" thick.
2 cups water
2 oz kosher salt
4.2g prague #1 =150ppm
2oz brown suger
2 cloves garlic
2tbs pickling spice
Was in brine 6 days and cure was all the way through meat. Mom rinsed the meat and simmered in 1/2 gallon water with one tbs of pickling spice.
What do you think I did wrong?

 

[thirdeye]

So, Pop's brine has amounts for 1 gallon of brine, you used 2 cups which is 1/8th of the water called for? Did you adjust the amounts of everything else down at the same ratio? I would think that 6 days was shy of the 10 to 20 day immersion time recommended for beef roasts, and that affected the flavor.

Salt and cure can penetrate meat, molecules of other spices are too large to get very far. So, if you saw the nice pink/red color of corned beef this only means the salt and nitrites penetrated. Maybe you could have injected some of the brine, then immersed it in brine, but brining takes time.

 

[smokininthegarden]

Try a dry cure. Solves the problem of taking up space in the fridge and I think works much better.
For 3# of brisket make a rub of the following:

3 Tbl salt
3 Tbl sugar, white or brown
1 Tbl course ground black pepper
1 1/2 tsp ground allspice
1 1/2 tsp granulated garlic
3/4 tsp cure #1

Rub the mixture into the meat very well until all has adhered, wrap with several layers
of plastic wrap or better yet if you have a vac sealer do that. After a 2 week stay in the fridge
it is ready to cook. You can simmer in water if you like but I prefer to just leave it in the
Plastic wrap it is in and cook in the oven @ 170 deg for around 4 hours or until it reaches
temp.
If this to salty for your taste you can cut down on the salt on your next try until you get it right.
That is the beauty of the dry cure method, you can customize it to your liking with no need to
soak the meat in water to remove saltiness after it has been brined, which in my opinion
can be a hit or miss situation.

Cal