Pastrami

Slices of pastrami

Pastrami sandwich at the Carnegie Deli

Pastrami (Turkish: pastırma, Romanian: pastramă, Bulgarian: пастърма) is a meat product usually made from beef, and sometimes from pork, mutton or turkey. The raw meat is brined, partially dried, seasoned with herbs and spices, then smoked and steamed. In the United States, although beef plate is the traditional cut of meat for making pastrami, it is now common to see it made from beef brisket, beef round, and turkey. Like corned beef, pastrami was originally created as a way to preserve meat before refrigeration.

Etymology and origin

The name pastrami comes from Romanian pastramă, which in turn comes from Greek παστραμάς/παστουρμάς, itself borrowed from Turkish pastırma.^[1][2][3][4] The Turkish name comes from the Turkish: bastırma et 'pressed meat'.^[5][6]

Wind-dried beef had been made in Anatolia for centuries, and Byzantine dried meat is probably "one of the forerunners of the pastirma of modern Turkey".^[7]

Early references in English used the spelling “pastrama”, closer to the Romanian pastramă. Pastrami was introduced to the United States in a wave of Jewish immigration from Bessarabia and Romania in the second half of the 19th century.^[8] The modified “pastrami” spelling was probably introduced in imitation of the American English salami.^[9] Romanian Jews emigrated to New York as early as 1872. Among Jewish Romanians, goose breasts were commonly made into pastrami because they were inexpensive. Beef navels were cheaper than goose meat in America, so the Romanian Jews in America adapted their recipe and began to make the cheaper-alternative beef pastrami.^[10]

New York’s Sussman Volk is generally credited with producing the first pastrami sandwich in the US in 1887. Volk, a kosher butcher and New York immigrant from Lithuania, claimed he got the recipe from a Romanian friend in exchange for storing the friend’s luggage while the friend returned to Romania. According to his descendant, Patricia Volk, Volk prepared pastrami according to the recipe and served it on sandwiches out of his butcher shop. The sandwich was so popular that Volk converted the butcher shop into a restaurant to sell pastrami sandwiches.^[11]

Preparation and serving

Pastrami pizza

New York pastrami is generally made from the navel end of the brisket.^[12] It is cured in brine, coated with a mix of spices such as garlic, coriander, black pepper, paprika, cloves, allspice, and mustard seed,^[13][14] and then smoked. Finally, the meat is steamed until the connective tissues within the meat break down into gelatin.

In North America, pastrami is typically sliced and served hot on rye bread to make a common New York deli sandwich (pastrami on rye), sometimes accompanied by coleslaw and Russian dressing. Pastrami and coleslaw are also combined in a Rachel sandwich, a variation of the popular Reuben sandwich that uses corned beef and sauerkraut.

In Los Angeles, Jewish deli-style pastrami sandwiches typically use hot pastrami straight from the steamer, sliced and layered on rye bread. At fast food stands, pastrami is usually sliced thin and served hot on a French roll, with or without some of the brine; the sandwich is often topped with yellow mustard and/or pickle chips. Pastrami may also be used as a topping on hamburgers.

Israeli Pastrami sandwich, made with pita bread, harissa, and roasted peppers

Greek immigrants to Salt Lake City in the early 1960s introduced a hamburger topped with pastrami and a special sauce. The pastrami burger has remained a staple of local burger chains in Utah.^[15]

Variations

Turkey pastrami is made by processing turkey breast (pale pink) or thigh (dark pink) in a fashion similar to red-meat pastrami, in an effort to simulate the red-meat deli product.

See also

• Bündnerfleisch
• Pastırma
• Pastramă
• List of dried foods
• List of smoked foods
• Montreal-style smoked meat
• Food portal

References

Notes

Further reading

• Ursula Heinzelmann, "Rauchware aus der Querrippe" in Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung (22 August 2010) p. 50 [paysite]