'hump' of beef........anyone tried it? and how to cook?

[jaideeguy]

I was in Makro today with the wife and noticed a sign for 'hump' of beef. There was a friendly, but non English speaking butcher nearby and I asked the wife to inquire about the hump. according to [reluctant] translation, the butcher says that is actually the hump of the locally grown Brahma and is quite tender, so I bought a 2 kilo roast @ 250/kilo and now wondering what I'm going to do with it........

any suggestions????

[butterisbetter]

Actually, the hump of the brahma cow or steer is mostly feet. I think the beef hump is actually a piece of the chuck.

[jaideeguy]

Actually, the hump of the brahma cow or steer is mostly feet. I think the beef hump is actually a piece of the chuck.

the hump is mostly 'feet'?? maybe you mean fat?? The piece that I got today does look more like a chuck steak [little fat] and I reason that there is hardly any muscle in the hump, like most of the cow is full of......................maybe it might be tender and unless I stumble upon a recipe saying to cook it slow and long like a stew, I might take a chance and cook it as a med rare roast.

[butterisbetter]

Yes, I meant fat.

[meatboy]

maybe its a misprint should have read "lump" for 250bht a kilo i would cook it slow.

as for asking a butcher in makro,we asked him sunday do you have any ausi.beef steak?

the nod and yes showed the wf.nz.lamb.did by some nida beef mince for burgers,very,very tasty.

[DonaldBattles]

Normally the hump is tough. You might want to think about marinating it for 18 hours before roasting. From years in the beef business in Thailand the only part of the brahman beef cow that can be consumed with out mechanical or chemical tenderizing is the tenderloin or fillet. Exception to those who have strong jaw muscles.

[meatboy]

Normally the hump is tough. You might want to think about marinating it for 18 hours before roasting. From years in the beef business in Thailand the only part of the brahman beef cow that can be consumed with out mechanical or chemical tenderizing is the tenderloin or fillet. Exception to those who have strong jaw muscles.

no problem with the jaw muscles but there's not many teeth attached.if the hump is a cheap cut and is cooked accordingly it should be tasty,what part of the cow is this cut?

[jaideeguy]

Normally the hump is tough. You might want to think about marinating it for 18 hours before roasting. From years in the beef business in Thailand the only part of the brahman beef cow that can be consumed with out mechanical or chemical tenderizing is the tenderloin or fillet. Exception to those who have strong jaw muscles.

no problem with the jaw muscles but there's not many teeth attached.if the hump is a cheap cut and is cooked accordingly it should be tasty,what part of the cow is this cut?

The 'hump' is the 'hump'......that hump that is characteristic of Brahma cows above the shoulders and I've always assumed that it was fatty, but the butcher at Makro says not and the piece that I bought is mostly lean with little tendon or fat.

Don......any suggestions for an 18 hr marinate?? and after the marinate, should I cook it like a roast beef?? fast and med rare or slow like a pot roast??

BTW......I've bought a few local tenderloins and they all were anything but tender.

Edited July 10, 2013 by jaideeguy

[DonaldBattles]

Regarding the marinate, you can use red wine, garlic, little olive oil, little brown sugar, crushed pineapples, rub salt and pepper. Easy on the pineapple as it makes the surface mushy. Or choose your own seasoning. It is the wine that breaks it down best. Turn it over a couple of times to make sure the marinate is even.

Recommend you punch some holes in all sides and let the marinate soak in good. If it is marinated good then heating and browning off in the oven is enough (pre-heat oven, 30 minutes at 180C). I might note that that the meat will look red like it has not been cooked but the marinate has fixed this. I have done many flank steaks like this and they come nice and red but done.

There are many marinate recipes on the internet. You might see one you like better.

Let me know how it comes out.

Now I have closed my restaurant and factory. At 80 I need to concentrate on, fish farming, gardening, growing Mexican peppers, making pepper sauce, pickled jalapeño peppers and active sex life.

[DonaldBattles]

maybe its a misprint should have read "lump" for 250bht a kilo i would cook it slow.

as for asking a butcher in makro,we asked him sunday do you have any ausi.beef steak?

the nod and yes showed the wf.nz.lamb.did by some nida beef mince for burgers,very,very tasty.

Normally the hump is tough. You might want to think about marinating it for 18 hours before roasting. From years in the beef business in Thailand the only part of the brahman beef cow that can be consumed with out mechanical or chemical tenderizing is the tenderloin or fillet. Exception to those who have strong jaw muscles.

no problem with the jaw muscles but there's not many teeth attached.if the hump is a cheap cut and is cooked accordingly it should be tasty,what part of the cow is this cut?

The 'hump' is the 'hump'......that hump that is characteristic of Brahma cows above the shoulders and I've always assumed that it was fatty, but the butcher at Makro says not and the piece that I bought is mostly lean with little tendon or fat.

Don......any suggestions for an 18 hr marinate?? and after the marinate, should I cook it like a roast beef?? fast and med rare or slow like a pot roast??

BTW......I've bought a few local tenderloins and they all were anything but tender.

Most Thai tenderloins are tough as the cows grow up on the road side. There is only one quality supplier and grower of beef in Thailand and that is Beef Pro. I did business with them for 16 years.

[jaideeguy]

Well, congratulations on making it to 80 Don and to being finally retired!! But sorry to hear that you closed down your restaurant before I had a chance to sample it.

I do have some Prague cure #1 [pink salt] that I use for my smoking bacon hoby....would that be a good addition to the marinate that you suggest?? Your suggested ingredients are about my taste for beef/pork and I always throw in lots of garlic. Thanks for that.

It's almost 2 kilos and I may cut it in half and do one slow and long and the other as a marinated roast as you suggested.

BTW, are you still doing the chipolte peppers up there?? and if you are interested in growing some 'hickory king' dent corn for real masa tortillas, I still have a few kilos of viable seed that I'll give you or anyone else, just to keep the strain pure and hope that maybe if you get a bumper crop, you'll share back.

enjoy your retirement and active sex life.....

[DonaldBattles]

Recommend that you do not use the prague as it is a salt peter used for slow curring and long term use.

Chipotle is a smoked pepper. I am only doing the sauce now and shipping to Foodland Bangkok.

I live in a 5 Rai compound in the foot hills of Doi Hang 7 km from the city. I fell in love with Chiang Rai 25 years a go and looked forward to retiring here. Recommend that you spend 150 Baht and have me down load Merchant Of The Orient, An Entrepreneurs's Journey in Life. I think your credit is good for such a large amount. This book is a lot about Thailand and my life starting in 1940 on the farm.

Email: [email protected]

[jaideeguy]

Thanks for the tips Don....just sent you an email at your donsfoods address to get info on buying your book.

Aloha, JDG from CM

[billd766]

I don't know if these are of any use but if I want a particular cut of meat I give a picture to my wife and she either knows the correct Thai words or shows the local butcher and if he doesn't have it he usually gets it from his supplier.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Chipotle is a smoked pepper. I am only doing the sauce now and shipping to Foodland Bangkok.

Hi Don... Just as a a quick aside, LOVE your chipotle sauce... Buy it every week at Foodland here in BKK, along with some japapeno sauce as well. They're a staple on my morning omelettes over rice, as well as on lunch burritos, etc etc.

Just have two wishes: 1] that you keep growing your peppers and making your sauces for many years to come. 2] that you'd offer your sauces in larger sized bottles/sizes than the current 90 ml ones.

I go thru the chipotle sauce like drinking water.

[DonaldBattles]

The chipotle sauce will soon be available in 150 ml bottles and 5 liter plastic jugs. They can be sent from Chiang Rai to Bangkok. Foodland only wants the 90 ml bottles. The next batch that I make will have 150 ml bottles that can be refilled from the 5 liter jugs.

[kikoman]

I have found some very acceptable beef steaks at Makro, just fried up by the wife her way, Let us know how the meat Hump turns out as that maybe something I can buy in the future. We tried the cheaper cuts of beef steaks that were very tough!

We will make our monthly trip to Macro in 4 days if you cook and eat the meat before then post the results, one of the problem I found with Thai beef it is too lean ( not enough fat) which contribute to the toughness.

Please note DO NOT use curing salt for anything, other than curing meat and then only in the recommended amounts, the less you ingress the better!

Cheers:

[jaideeguy]

I 'burned the hump of the beast' yesterday afternoon!! Cut it into 2 pieces and both got a version of the marinate that Don suggested with a lot of added wine and garlic poked into holes that I stabbed into the flesh and even added some chilipotle peppers and Worcestershire but no pineapple.

It sat in the fridge overnight and I fired up my smoker to f300+ and while waiting for it to come up to heat, I wrapped one chunk in aluminum foil as suggested by a friend and left the other open to the direct heat.

When the smoker was hot, I placed both roasts in and put some lumiyai wood chips on the propane gas hob for some extra smoke flavor.....left it at high heat for about a half hr until the smoke disapated, then turned it down to f225 and let it slow cook for 2 more hrs.

End result.......medium cooked, very tasty, but lots of work to chew, so I cut it into as thin of slices as I could.....1/8th inch and wishing I had a deli type meat slicer.

Will I buy it again??/ yes and will research other methods to cook it, but in actual fact, it was just a very lean muscle of a grass fed Brahma bull and no way to make it 'cut with a fork tender'.

Lots of left overs that I'll probably to use in a beef stew and maybe cut it into tiny cubes for roast beef hash.

I did take some pics and will try to post them when I have time.

[butterisbetter]

I 'burned the hump of the beast' yesterday afternoon!! Cut it into 2 pieces and both got a version of the marinate that Don suggested with a lot of added wine and garlic poked into holes that I stabbed into the flesh and even added some chilipotle peppers and Worcestershire but no pineapple.

It sat in the fridge overnight and I fired up my smoker to f300+ and while waiting for it to come up to heat, I wrapped one chunk in aluminum foil as suggested by a friend and left the other open to the direct heat.

When the smoker was hot, I placed both roasts in and put some lumiyai wood chips on the propane gas hob for some extra smoke flavor.....left it at high heat for about a half hr until the smoke disapated, then turned it down to f225 and let it slow cook for 2 more hrs.

End result.......medium cooked, very tasty, but lots of work to chew, so I cut it into as thin of slices as I could.....1/8th inch and wishing I had a deli type meat slicer.

Will I buy it again??/ yes and will research other methods to cook it, but in actual fact, it was just a very lean muscle of a grass fed Brahma bull and no way to make it 'cut with a fork tender'.

Lots of left overs that I'll probably to use in a beef stew and maybe cut it into tiny cubes for roast beef hash.

I did take some pics and will try to post them when I have time.

Actually, it's the pineapple that has the most tenderizing power thanks to an enzyme it contains called bromelaine. The same stuff that can make your mouth sore. While you're eating the pineapple, it's eating you.

[jaideeguy]

I 'burned the hump of the beast' yesterday afternoon!! Cut it into 2 pieces and both got a version of the marinate that Don suggested with a lot of added wine and garlic poked into holes that I stabbed into the flesh and even added some chilipotle peppers and Worcestershire but no pineapple.

It sat in the fridge overnight and I fired up my smoker to f300+ and while waiting for it to come up to heat, I wrapped one chunk in aluminum foil as suggested by a friend and left the other open to the direct heat.

When the smoker was hot, I placed both roasts in and put some lumiyai wood chips on the propane gas hob for some extra smoke flavor.....left it at high heat for about a half hr until the smoke disapated, then turned it down to f225 and let it slow cook for 2 more hrs.

End result.......medium cooked, very tasty, but lots of work to chew, so I cut it into as thin of slices as I could.....1/8th inch and wishing I had a deli type meat slicer.

Will I buy it again??/ yes and will research other methods to cook it, but in actual fact, it was just a very lean muscle of a grass fed Brahma bull and no way to make it 'cut with a fork tender'.

Lots of left overs that I'll probably to use in a beef stew and maybe cut it into tiny cubes for roast beef hash.

I did take some pics and will try to post them when I have time.

Actually, it's the pineapple that has the most tenderizing power thanks to an enzyme it contains called bromelaine. The same stuff that can make your mouth sore. While you're eating the pineapple, it's eating you.

I assumed that it was an enzyme and am a little reluctant to use enzymes with tough meat, as I once used some green papaya in a marinate and it turned to ugly grey mush. Maybe there is a formula for using enzymes as there seems to be a find line between mush and tough?? And using enzymes with a large piece of roast......could you inject it??

[DonaldBattles]

I mentioned previously that no parts of the Thai beef are tender except the tenderloin in some grades of beef cattle.

For the hump, next time slice in in 1/2 to 1 inch slices, using an aluminum tenderizing mallett pound it. Do not poiund so much that it is as thin as a MacDonalds burger patty. Then marinate for 18 hours. I think that it can be eatable if it is completely marinated along with mechanical tenderizing before marination. It may take a little longer based on your mix. With a little effort you may have found a good chunk of meat that taste good because it is all lean.

[jaideeguy]

Yes, it was quite lean and may try your trick Don. I did a recipe that was posted earlier......a Korean pear marinate and it was decently chewable and had a great taste. http://www.thaivisa.com/forum/topic/649415-thai-beef-buy-a-steak-marinate-it-and-hope-for-the-best/

Re: my hump......I've done a bit of googling on Bramah beef and read that the hump is mostly fat, so I really don't think it was a hump that I bought.....maybe the shoulder muscle?

Edited July 15, 2013 by jaideeguy

[wayned]

I cook Thai roast often with good results, but have never seen or tried "hump" of beef. I usually buy sirloin at the local market that comes once a week. I preheat the oven, full size standing oven, to its maximum temp for about 30 minutes. I only salt and pepper and sprinkle a little garlic powder on the beef and place it on a rack in a pan. I cook it 16 minutes per kilo, at full emp, usually have a 1 - 2 kilo slab. Then turn the oven off and let it sit unopened for 2- 3 hours. The beef comes out on the rare side like I like it. I trim the fat and grizzle and I then cut it as I use it, as thin as possible for sandwiches and sometimes I freeze 2 cm slabs that I heat up by quickly browning in a very hot skillet. It usually comes out falvorful and chewable, but not fork tender