by Jonathan Thompson

Corned beef has gotten everyone from NASA to the Catholic Church to change the rules. Throughout history, this classic dish of cured meat has led to rule breaking on early manned space flights and in a millennium of religious doctrine for the Irish. For me, corned beef is a tradition passed down through my family, and one of my favorite meals. 

I was expecting good things when I walked into Zingerman’s Deli in the old Irish neighborhood of Kerrytown. Zingerman’s was founded in 1982 by Paul Saginaw and Ari Weinzweig, providing baked goods, cheeses, and deli sandwiches to Ann Arbor (“About Us”). It’s known to have high quality sandwiches, equipped with freshly baked bread, homemade cheese, and piles of delicious deli meats. I ordered their corned beef reuben sandwich to go. When it arrived, its contents revealed the trademark dark pink of the corned beef of my youth. It smelled delicious, like a fresh cut of beef with freshly baked bread. It tasted even better, bringing me back to my childhood corned beef stews with my family, with its salty, savory flavor, and soft, stringy consistency. Yet, the sandwich also added a new dimensionality to the dish with its tangy sauerkraut, which complemented the corned beef with its similar texture. The sandwich was also massive, and there was no way for me to finish it all in one sitting. 

Despite the name, there’s no corn in corned beef. It’s produced via a curing process involving salt crystals called “corns," which give the dish its name, and potassium nitrate, a curing agent which supplies its pink hue (Mac Con Iomaire). The Irish dish has been made since the Middle Ages creating a widely exported version of the dish which has become renowned for its excellence (Mac Con Iomaire). 

But corned beef has caused trouble throughout its history. For example, in 1965, astronaut John Young smuggled a corned beef sandwich onboard the Gemini 3 spaceflight. He was reprimanded by NASA due to the potential damage caused by crumbs infiltrating electronics in zero gravity, and food smuggling was banned from future space missions (Fessenden). The Catholic Church also updated religious doctrine for corned beef. American Irish have a long standing tradition of eating corned beef on St. Patrick’s Day. However, many Irish Americans are Catholic, and celebrate Lent, a period of 40 days leading up to Easter in which the consumption of meat (excluding fish) is forbidden on Friday. An issue arises when St. Patrick’s Day falls on a Friday, as the corned beef tradition conflicts with Lent. Some Catholic dioceses respond to this by lifting the ban on corned beef for St. Patrick’s Day alone, providing a unique case (“Update”). My family is Catholic, and when I was younger, we would eat corned beef on a St. Patrick’s Day Friday, if our diocese allowed it, which was usually the case. If not, we waited until the next day to enjoy our corned beef, but we would still prepare it on St. Patrick’s Day.

The consumption of corned beef is a common trend among Irish Americans. For generations, my Irish family has prepared corned beef every St. Patrick’s Day, with the tradition dating back to my great grandparents. When I was younger my mom and I would work together to prepare a corned beef stew for the holiday. Our recipe consisted of corned beef, beef broth,with onions, potatoes and cabbage to round out the dish. Growing up, the savory corned beef flavor permeating the vegetables of this stew was something I looked forward to every year.

Corned beef has been a staple throughout history, in doing so causing conflict in religious tradition, as well as high stakes missions. It has provided identity to Irish Americans and a means for celebration on St. Patrick’s Day, and will thus create more opportunities for families to come together. Corned beef has given me time with my family and delicious meals, for which I’m eternally grateful.