Name: How to cook corned beef in a pressure cooker
Cook time: 60 min
Total time: 60 min
Yield: 6
Ingredients: 1.5 kilogram (3-pound) piece corned beef silverside; 1 brown onion (150g), chopped coarsely; 2 dried bay leaves; 6 black peppercorns; 1 carrot (120g), chopped coarsely; 1 stalk celery (150g), trimmed, chopped coarsely; 2 tablespoon light brown sugar; 2 tablespoon malt vinegar; 1.5 litre (6 cups) water, approximately

Take a trip back to your childhood with this old fashioned corned beef recipe, which is sped up thanks to a pressure cooker. While the traditional stovetop method for cooking corned beef takes at least two hours, and using a slow cooker can stretch it out to six hours or more, you can cook tender, deliciously flavoured corned beef in around an hour with this recipe. Serve warm with creamy mashed potato or your choice of sides, and you’ll have a

Ingredients

1.5 kilogram (3-pound) piece corned beef silverside

1 brown onion (150g), chopped coarsely

2 dried bay leaves

6 black peppercorns

1 carrot (120g), chopped coarsely

1 stalk celery (150g), trimmed, chopped coarsely

2 tablespoon light brown sugar

2 tablespoon malt vinegar

1.5 litre (6 cups) water, approximately

Method

Combine beef, onion, bay leaves, peppercorns, carrot, celery, sugar, vinegar and enough of the water to barely cover beef in 6-litre (24-cup) pressure cooker; secure lid. Bring cooker to high pressure. Reduce heat to stabilise pressure; cook 45 minutes.

Release pressure using the quick release method; remove lid. Stand beef in cooking liquid 15 minutes. Remove beef from cooker. Serve sliced, warm or cold.

Does cooking beef in a pressure cooker make it tender?

A pressure cooker makes it easy to tenderise beef because it’s sealed in with the liquid, which steams as the pressure cooker reaches very high temperatures and helps soften the meat fibres. As well as creating tender beef, it’s also full of flavour thanks to the cooking process.

If you’re new to using a pressure cooker, make sure you read the instructions for your model. You can also check out our pressure cooking guide for more practical tips and insights.

What is the best method for cooking corned beef?

Whether you cook delicious corned beef in a pressure cooker, slow cooker on on the stove, there’s no particular method that’s better than others. But the qualities of a particular method might suit you more, or might be called for in a particular recipe or situation.

For example, if you don’t have much time, a pressure cooker is the fastest way to cook corned beef perfectly. But if you’re feeling traditional or want to spend a while in the kitchen, the stovetop method might be a better choice. Slow cookers, on the other hand, take a long time to cook the beef which allows it to absorb flavour and become tender and juicy. If you don’t have a slow cooker, you could also use an oven and get similar results with a low heat and covered dish.

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This recipe was published on April 18, 2021 and updated on 31 October 2024 with more details.

Women's Weekly Food

Trusted by home cooks for 90 years, The Australian Women’s Weekly’s Test Kitchen and cookbooks hold a singular place in shaping home cooking within the Australian culinary landscape. Today, the AWW Test Kitchen in Sydney is a thriving hub for food content, connected to two bustling photographic studios where a talented team of Australia’s best recipe developers, art directors, editors and photographers create our world class food content. Our recipes are thoroughly tested and tasted and given the Test Kitchen tick of approval, guaranteeing you’ll get great results in your home kitchen.

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